When the Society of Jesus announced its four Universal Apostolic Preferences for the next decade in February 2019, you might expect that the members of the JCAP Ignatian Spirituality Network (ISN) were pleased that the first Universal Apostolic Preference (UAP) involved the Spiritual Exercises. You’d be right. Yet, we’re still just identifying the “hungers” of our contemporaries. We’re still determining what difference our few “loaves and fishes” might be able to make. What’s instructive already is that the development of our new network has itself been an exercise in Ignatian discernment.
The UAPs are not about programmes or even networks but about the values and dispositions that programmes and networks embody. As Superior General Fr Arturo Sosa SJ has pointed out, the Spiritual Exercises are not the goal of the first UAP. “Showing the way to God” is the goal. Ignatian spirituality and discernment are the particular means the Society can contribute to that end.
That said, ISN is obviously well situated to begin “feeding” JCAP as it engages UAP #1 in concert with the other three UAPs. ISN was launched formally only recently (2017). Our initial step was to foster mutual awareness of the spiritual ministries in Asia Pacific, to take inventory of our “loaves and fishes”. At our gathering in Chiang Mai, Thailand (May 2018), we shared the programmes and best practices of the various retreat houses and spirituality centres. Then we imagined together what “added value” a network of spirituality ministries could provide. What would God accomplish, given our slim resources and the vast needs in our vast part of the world?
We began our discernment by identifying both the needs of each JCAP province or region and what each province or region could contribute to others in JCAP. We conducted that conversation with two goals in mind: (1) to promote Ignatian spirituality in the Asia Pacific context; and (2) to deepen the Ignatian character of all our ministries. JCAP President Fr Tony Moreno SJ participated in those discussions and highlighted the most promising potential contributions ISN could make to JCAP.
Through Fr Sosa, the major superiors, General Congregation 36, and even Pope Francis’s call for a “more discerning” Church, God appears to be prompting the Society of Jesus and its collaborators in our time not to limit ourselves to individual discernment but to become more open to – and more skilled at — “discernment in common”. In preparation for Chiang Mai, each JCAP provincial or regional superior had appointed a representative to the ISN, creating a group of 13 co-discerners. Collectively, we have had no trouble identifying the spiritual needs of various populations in Asia Pacific (cradle Catholics, the unchurched, youth, migrants, non-Christians, etc). The needs are many, of course, and resources quite limited. How can we even begin to “feed the crowd”?
In trying to answer that question, we have been trying to practise the sort of spiritual conversation that was employed in the Society-wide discernment of the UAPs from 2017-2019. At our meeting in Changhua, Taiwan (May 2019), we made an examen of our own way of proceeding under the guidance of facilitator Fr Elton Fernandes of the Chinese Province. The openness and sheer goodwill of ISN representatives gathered there made it a consoling experience. One member of the group noted that our prayer and spiritual conversation yielded a “growing clarity” and enthusiasm. We experienced a shared sense of accepting a mission to share our “loaves and fishes”, before we turned to the details of apostolic planning.
In July 2018, having heard a number of our suggestions, the major superiors helped us zero in on two particular projects they believed would have maximum impact around the conference, especially in the “younger” units. Then in Changhua, we determined that we had enough collective confidence to push ahead on the first project, building on the momentum of the UAP discernment process. In the months since that meeting in Changhua, the major superiors have missioned nearly 40 participants to ISN’s first major undertaking: a weeklong workshop on “discernment in common and apostolic planning” (DICAP) to be held in Taiwan this spring.
Every JCAP province and region will be represented, and the coordinating team will bring together resources from the Roman Curia, the European Conference, and JCAP. The programme will consist of input, experiential learning, prayer, and spiritual conversation. Once formed in this way, these disciples will be asked to carry their “loaves and fishes” to the multitude gathered on hillsides back home. That is, they will become discernment guides for communities and ministries in their home units in the future, building a culture of discernment in the Church of Asia Pacific.
The second undertaking encouraged by the major superiors was a programme to train spiritual directors and supervisors. This will be a more in-depth effort, so we agreed to move more slowly on it. In order to serve well the “younger” JCAP units, we will have to assemble resources from existing programmes and complement them with attention to special questions, e.g., best practices in working with collaborators of other faith traditions. Our tentative plan is to sponsor a three-year training programme beginning in 2021.
Sometimes it doesn’t feel like 13 of us can have an impact on a population of over 1 billion in Asia Pacific. However, we have learned already that we are not alone on the hillside, listening to the Lord. We find ourselves growing as a network, reaching out both within and beyond JCAP. We’ve begun the process of appointing mutual liaisons with several of the other networks and secretariats that have expressed interest in deepening their own articulation of Ignatian mission. We’ve also been asked to join the Basic Education and Youth Ministry sectors for a joint conference on ministry to youth and young adults late in 2020.
Where are we going, and whom are we feeding with our few “loaves and fishes”? In just three years, we have moved from brainstorming to discerning to apostolic planning, though the discernment will always have to be ongoing in order to keep the planning grounded in the Gospel. For now, our immediate hope lies in capacity building for men and women grounded in the Exercises, so that they can lead others in the same spirit.
UAP #1 has affirmed what ISN was already about. It also identifies our efforts as contributions to the missio Dei and unites them to the ministries associated with the other three UAPs. In short, we continue to discern what God is leading the Society of Jesus and its collaborators in JCAP to do – in order to “multiply” the spiritual legacy of St Ignatius in Asia Pacific.
Thomas Benz SJ
Ignatian Spirituality Network Coordinator