"Most high and glorious
God, bring light to the darkness of my heart. Give me right faith,
certain hope, and perfect charity. Lord, give me insight and wisdom, so
I can always discern your holy and true will"
-St. Francis of Assisi
"Prayer Before the Crucifix"
What Is Spiritual Direction?
Spiritual direction is an interpersonal relationship in which one
person helps another to reflect on his experiences in the light of the
Gospel and Christian wisdom. Through this process, individuals are led and
encouraged to discover their unique call in life.
What Is the Role of a Spiritual Director?
A spiritual director is one who willingly walks this faith journey with
another. A spiritual director listens, encourages, challenges and prays
with the individual who freely shares the movements of the Spirit in his
life.
Not everyone is in need of spiritual direction in every phase of life.
But it is a helpful means of discernment, especially when an individual is
seeking to discover the will of God in his life. A time of special
direction may be when a person is searching to discover how to live out
his Christian call to service.
How do I find a Spiritual Director?
Though spiritual direction can and does occur within every community in
the Church, it is not always easy to find a spiritual director. Here are
some general hints:
- Talk to your parish priest. He could give you the names of qualified
priests, religious, or lay people in the diocese whom you could
contact.
- Retreat centers, college Newman Centers, and ministries to young
adults are primary places to receive support and a list of individuals
engaged in spiritual direction.
- Offices of continuing education for priests, deacon formation
programs, seminaries, and renewal centers for religious may offer
additional names.
What Should I Look for in Spiritual Direction?
A spiritual director can help you to be more aware of and respond to
God's revelation as you experience it affectively -- in your
emotions, not just in your mind. Thus, spiritual direction deals not only
with the intellect, but the heart as well. In this sense, it is concerned
with the whole person.
A spiritual director can help you express your struggles, pain, joys,
and gratitude, and to share these with God; to notice God's presence in
your life and your prayers; to savor, relive, and respond to your
experience of God; and, finally, to notice interior changes and the
effects these changes have on your relationships and your life. Such a
task is not easy, even though God is present and active in spiritual
direction and, indeed, is the primary spiritual director.
What Should My Relationship Be with My Director?
For you to share openly about intimate relationships such as those you
have with the people and the God you love, you must have a solid
relationship with your spiritual director. The following five qualities
can help to solidify that relationship.
- COMPANIONSHIP. You meet your spiritual director as a
companion, nor as a teacher, a guru or a problem-solver. As a midwife
facilitates the birth of a child, so a spiritual director accompanies
you in the growth of your relationship with God.
- EMPATHY. As a companion, a spiritual director relates to you
with empathy. In fact, authors on spiritual direction speak of "deep empathy." By this they mean the spiritual director
engages wholeheartedly in your experience, striving to enter your
world as if it is his own.
This empathetic presence means the director allows your struggles,
joys, hopes, and experiences of God to touch him affectively.
To do that, among other things, a spiritual director listens actively
with compassion, not passively with detachment.
- CARE. A good spiritual director cares for you deeply and
shows it. The director's love, as God's love, can heal. Almost always
such caring will free you to share your spiritual life more openly,
for the director's care evokes trust and confidence from you. From the
beginning you need to have the feeling that your director considers
what you are sharing to be precious and sacred. As your meetings
continue, the feeling of love and reverence should deepen.
- NATURALNESS. Look for a spiritual director who can laugh or
cry spontaneously when something you share calls for such a response.
If you sense your director is not natural, not relaxed, it will no
doubt become a roadblock to the free sharing necessary for fruitful
spiritual direction.
- COMMITMENT. A director's commitment to you and to your
relationship is essential. There are going to be ups and downs in a
spiritual direction relationship. These are most likely to occur as
you make changes and as you grow which, remember, is the goal of your
encounters. For successful spiritual direction, you must know your
director will stand with you in times of such stress.
The more deeply these five qualities of relationship--companionship,
empathy, care, naturalness, and commitment -- are present in spiritual
direction, the more likely it will achieve its primary purpose: helping
you grow in a personal relationship with a loving God. Don't overlook the
fact that you also have responsibilities -- to be open, honest, and
committed to your own growth.
What Atmosphere Should I Expect in Spiritual Direction?
Your spiritual director strives to create an environment where you can
notice more clearly God's communication to you and your reaction to it.
Primarily, the spiritual director will do this in two ways: by fostering a
contemplative atmosphere and by using an evocative approach.
- CONTEMPLATIVE ATMOSPHERE.
Your spiritual director will seek to create
an atmosphere where you can look at, become absorbed in, relive, and
respond to your experiences of God. In doing this, the
director will try to help you focus on how God is present in your life
and prayer and not on how you think God should be present or will be in
the future.
For example, a director might ask, "When you pray, who are you conscious of -- God as Father, Creator,
Friend, Jesus, Holy Spirit?" Or, "How does God seem to be
present with you now in your life?" The director will invite you to
look at what is actually happening and to spend time reflecting on it.
- EVOCATIVE APPROACH.
You can expect your director to use an evocative rather than a
didactic approach. Your director will strive to draw out what is
happening in your relationship with God. The idea here is that the
director is trying to allow God to stir your mind and heart instead of
instructing you about God and spiritual matters.
A spiritual director taking a didactic
approach might teach you about God as a loving God. A director taking an
evocative approach will help you to be open to the experience of God's
personal love for you. Think of the spiritual director as a stagehand
helping to set the stage for God's activity to take place.
Through an evocative approach your spiritual
director allows you to move at your own pace. Further, this approach
enables the director to help you notice and feel your interior reactions
to God's communication and to share these feelings with God. To a person
who has suffered a painful loss, a director using the evocative approach
might say, "How do you feel as you sense God wanting to be involved
with you in your sorrow?" If the person responds, "I feel
comfortable and grateful," the director might continue, "Did
you think of sharing your gratitude with God?" In this way, the
director evokes a dialogue between the person and God that can continue
in the person's prayer.
A Sacred Gift
Spiritual directors offer a sacred gift by being a caring companion and
fostering a contemplative presence. If spiritual direction is done well,
you will receive the support you need to pay attention to and respond to
God who is already present and active in your life. What's more, it's very
likely that your relationship with God will grow. And that's a very good
thing.
Sources:
L. Patrick Carroll and Katherine M.
Dyckman, "The Emergence of Spiritual Direction," PRAYING;
Spirituality for Everyday Living, March-April 1989, pp
5-8.
Maureen Conroy, "What to Look for in Your Spiritual
Director," PRAYING: Spirituality for Everyday
Living, January-February 1990, pp 9-11.
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