A new app is providing a fresh take on the 500-year-old prayer created by St Ignatius of Loyola. Reimagining the Examen is a fresh and customized prayer app inspired by the Examen, a practice that helps you review your day in the presence of God. With unique Examens tailored to various moods, needs and situations, the app invites you to pray from where you are, wherever you are.
Loyola Press developed the app based on Fr Mark Thibodeaux SJ’s best-selling book, Reimagining the Ignatian Examen, which offers flexible and adaptable versions of the Examen. Fr Thibodeaux, the novice director of the Jesuits Central and Southern Province, offers thoughtful reflections on relationships, pending decisions, and gratitude that translate seamlessly to the app. He had been using his own crude form of the Examen app on a Word document on his phone for years. He knew the practice worked for him, and hoped it would for others too.
“If there’s any prayer that can be called a prayer on the go, it’s the Examen. It just cries out for an app,” he said. “Reimagining the Examen offers you the chance to engage with God right there in the middle of your busy day, right there at work, right there at school, and bring God into the nitty-gritty of your day.”
With soothing music and step-by-step guidance, users are invited to quiet their thoughts, sense God’s presence, and examine a grace-filled moment, a particular encounter, a daily habit, an inner wound, or their relationship with God. Users can choose from reflections that fit their current state of being, or select the day’s allotted Examen. Either way, they’re swipes away from a small but mighty practice—one that brings clarity, mindfulness, and grace.
Reimagining the Examen is available on iTunes and on Google Play. Find about more about the app here.