Spiritual Direction

By Fr. Conor Donnelly

(Proofread)

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

My Lord and my God, I firmly believe that you are here, that you see me, that you hear me. I adore you with profound reverence. I ask your pardon for my sins and grace to make this time of prayer fruitful. My Immaculate Mother, Saint Joseph, my father and lord, my guardian angel, intercede for me.

I heard a story once of a professional man, advanced in years, who had a problem in his company—something to do with management—and he had consulted many management consultants, but somehow the problem was not getting solved.

This was a man who took his Christian life very seriously, he tried to lead a holy life, and he realized that his professional problem was beginning to affect his spiritual life. It was on his mind very much and he was praying a lot about it.

He decided he should bring up the matter in spiritual direction, which he had in a regular way. The person he was chatting with was maybe forty years younger than him, but he mentioned the problem with great faith and great humility.

The young person to whom he was chatting told him, Why don't you look at this particular area or investigate it from this particular line? He just said some little phrase.

This younger person had no experience of that particular problem, or that particular type of work or business, or anything, and just mentioned a particular direction in which to move.

When this man later brought it to his prayer, he was realizing, Well, really, that's what the solution is. He did not get it from all the professional people he consulted, but he got the answer to his question in spiritual direction.

The Holy Spirit works through spiritual direction. He uses His instruments and we get the light of the Holy Spirit then, when we live with faith and approach spiritual direction with humility, and listen carefully to what is said to us and try and put it into practice.

In the Gospel of St. John, Our Lord says, “He who follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life” (John 8:12).

“For if they fall,” we are told in the Old Testament, in Ecclesiastes, “one will lift up his fellow. But woe to him who is alone when he falls and has not another to lift him up!” (Eccles. 4:10).

We encounter the Good Shepherd in spiritual direction. Each one of us needs a good shepherd to direct our soul because none of us can map out our own course without the special help of God.

Lack of objectivity, the exaggerated love we have for ourselves, laziness—all conspire to obscure our path to God, leading us to spiritual stagnation, lukewarmness, and discouragement.

On the other hand, St. John Climacus says, “In the same way that a ship with a good pilot arrives safely in port, so also will the soul that has a good shepherd safely reach its destination, even though it may many times have gone astray.”

A spiritual writer says, “Everyone knows that a guide is needed in order to climb a mountain without difficulty. The same thing happens when it's a matter of a spiritual climb…and even more so, in that here one must avoid the pitfalls set by the devil, who dearly wants to bring us down” (Réginald Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).

We all need spiritual direction so that at the end of our lives we won't have to say what the Israelites said after wandering about the desert without direction or meaningful purpose. They said: “For forty years we went round and round the mountain” (Deut. 2:1).

We have lived, they said, without rhyme or reason, without knowing where we were going, without our work or study bringing us any closer to God, without letting friendship or family, health or sickness, success or failure, take us one step forward towards what is really important: holiness and salvation.

St. John Paul II, in many of his encyclicals, says that there are concrete questions that all human persons must keep asking themselves in the course of their life: Where have I come from? Where am I going? What is my life all about?

He said the answers to those questions very often depends on the happiness that we will achieve in this world.

Often, to find out those answers, we need that spiritual guide so that we won't be in the position of having to say that we too have lived in the way that those early Israelites lived—pointlessly whiling away the time, absorbed in passing fancies—simply because we have no supernatural goal to aim at. We need a clear path to travel and a guide to lead us along that path.

It may be necessary to entrust the direction of our soul to someone, because we all need a kindly push when we get discouraged at our setbacks on our road to God. We need a friendly voice who can say to us, ‘Come on! Don't give in! God's grace is available to help you overcome every difficulty!’

Sometimes that person may be a priest, but often that person could be a layman or a laywoman—not any person, but someone formed, trained, qualified, experienced—because the Holy Spirit can use all sorts of instruments.

When we approach spiritual direction with that desire to be better, with that desire to improve, with faith, with humility, then the Holy Spirit lets Himself be known in very clear ways.

With the help of that spiritual director, we can regain our interior composure. We can be helped to see the hand of God behind any contradiction or any cross, no matter how great it may be. That spiritual director can help us to draw on forces which we had thought were not there anymore, and so we continue on our way.

We begin again like little children who may stumble as they begin to learn to walk. After that stumble or fall, they walk a little better. Maybe they even run.

It's a special grace from God to be able to rely on such a person who is both a friend and a confidant and who can help us so effectively in a matter of such great importance.

We can open our hearts to that person confidently, with a human and supernatural intention, and say all those things that we might have in our heart or in our mind or in our imagination.

Our Lord has told us that out of the heart of man come all sorts of ugly things—envy, jealousy, lust, pride, vanity (cf. Mark 7:21-23). These are the things we have to talk about in spiritual direction.

It can take an effort to get those things out, to get out all the garbage. Every person, every week, has things like that that they need to get rid of. We don't put garbage in the living room or in the bedroom or in the kitchen; we get rid of the garbage.

We go there each week, maybe keeping a record day to day so that we know what to talk about. Because that person is a friend and confidant and also very supernatural, we know that we can tell that person all the most terrible things that might pass through our mind and imagination.

St. Josemaría used to say, We are all potential Hitlers. We're all capable of the most terrible things (Josemaría Escrivá, cf. Christ Is Passing By, Point 15).

We can say those things to that person confidently and with humility, and that person will understand us, will encourage us, and will listen to us with affection. They won't call the police.

It can be a great joy to lay bare our most intimate thoughts and feelings, to let ourselves be known with all our miseries and wretchedness, and to direct all those things to God with the help of someone who understands us.

When a spiritual director hears somebody coming to them and telling them about all their miseries and failures and wretchedness, which are difficult to talk about, then the spiritual director knows this person is trying to be holy, because the spiritual director has been there themselves. They know what misery and wretchedness are, and what we're all like on the inside.

That person holds us in esteem, opens new horizons for us, supports us, prays for us. That person has a special grace from God to enable them to help us.

We come to be very convinced the Holy Spirit is at work. Often the spiritual director will tell us things that we will realize could only have come from God. That person is truly a good shepherd for us, the person God wants us to go to.

Pray about this reality. Ask the Holy Spirit to enlighten you or to lead you to somebody who can give you that spiritual direction. It’s so important and good for your soul and consequently, for the whole of your family, for your friends, for your environment.

Nobody can try to be a sports champion or break a record without some sort of trainer. In the spiritual life, we are called to be champions. “Be you perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matt. 5:48).

St. Luke tells us about the prodigal son who felt the need to be rid of the burden that weighed so heavily on his soul (cf. Luke 15:17-20).

Sometimes we might have something that weighs very heavily but when we talk about it, we see it in a different light. The very fact that we get it off our chest makes us see that thing more objectively, that perhaps it's not as bad as all that.

Judas also felt weighed down by the load of his betrayal (cf. Matt. 27:3-5).

The prodigal son went where he ought to have gone and found a peace that he could never have imagined. He regained his life, put a ring on his finger, put sandals on his feet. “My son was lost and is found; let us rejoice and make merry” (Luke 15:21-24).

Judas should have gone back to Jesus, who would have sheltered him and comforted him in spite of his sin.

That's what Peter did. “He went out, and wept bitterly” but he went back to Jesus. We're told that when he heard the cock crow, “the Lord turned and looked upon Peter” (Luke 22:61-62). He sought him out with His most loving glance.

But Judas went where he should not have gone: he went to those who were incapable of understanding and were unable to give that unfortunate person what he most needed. They said to him, “What is that to us? See to it yourself (Matt. 27:4).

If we ask the Holy Spirit, He will lead us to the right person: a person who is striving for holiness, a person who transmits the teaching of the Catholic Church, who speaks with faith, who’s available.

The gift of counsel is particularly needed by those whose mission it is to guide and direct other people. St. Thomas says that “every good piece of advice regarding man's salvation comes from the Holy Spirit” (Thomas Aquinas, Commentary).

In spiritual direction, the advice we receive sometimes might be a word. It might be a virtue. It might be a phrase. It might be the smallest suggestion you could imagine.

But those little things might be “the mustard seed” (Matt. 13:31-32). that could change our life, our family, our work, our profession, our whole outlook on life.

That word might be the key for us to enter heaven. To recover our peace. To put order back in our life.

The advice we receive, where clearly and frequently the touch of the Holy Spirit can be evident, ought to be received with the joy that a wayfarer or a pilgrim has on finding the right path.

Write down those words. Bring them to your prayer. Think about them. In the course of the week, you may realize more and more that the Holy Spirit is there. Often the graces of God become more apparent with time.

A man came to see me once from another country. He had missed his promotion. He was very low. I encouraged him to go and read a chapter on pessimism in The Forge by St. Josemaría, which is probably the chapter that I have recommended most to professional people in the last forty years.

He went away and came back the following week and said, ‘I read through that chapter and there was one phrase there where St. Josemaría quotes Our Lord saying to the paralytic (The Forge, Point 231), ‘Take courage, my son’” (Matt. 9:2).

He said, ‘I've been repeating those words every moment of every hour of every day for the past seven days. Those words have kept me going this week.’

Often, we're pointed in a certain direction or to certain words or read this or read that, and the words may jump up out of the page and hit us in the face. The Holy Spirit doesn't let us down.

These are times to give thanks to God and to the person who represents Him, and to have a determination to put into practice what we have been advised.

And maybe, to ask the Holy Spirit for that gift of counsel for our advisor; also, that we might have that gift of counsel, so that we can help other people.

At times, that advice can have a special echo. You might find that echo coming back to you five years down the road, ten years down the road—things you never forget.

The gift of counsel is very special. It's necessary for everyday living, for ourselves and also to be able to advise our friends in their spiritual lives and in their undertakings.

One writer says this gift corresponds to the Beatitude about the merciful, because “one has to be merciful to know how to give helpful advice discreetly to those who need it; such advice, far from disheartening them, will encourage them gently and forcefully” (Réginald Garrigou-Lagrange, The Three Ages of the Interior Life).

In spiritual direction, sometimes we might hear something that we don't want to hear. But that something might be very important.

I read somewhere once that the greatest charity is to confront people with the truth: the truth about things that are wrong, because wrong things don't lead us to heaven.

Sometimes we might not want to hear the truth, or we might not like to hear the truth, particularly if it's about the truth about ourselves. But “humility is truth” (St. Teresa of Avila, The Interior Castle).

If we hear something some time that we don't particularly like, it may be all the more important to bring it to our prayer, to think about it, to let time pass. Little by little, we may see the wisdom of those words.

The Holy Spirit helps us to be docile to His inspirations, because often the greatest obstacle to the gift of counsel taking root in our souls is attachment to our own judgment—‘I know. I know what I need. I know what is right for my family. I know the sort of thing that I should be doing’—not knowing how to give way, lack of humility, hastiness in acting, not knowing how to listen. To listen is very important in our life.

We facilitate this gift if we become accustomed to bring to our prayer any important decision we have to make. In The Way, St. Josemaría says, “Never make a decision without first stopping to consider the matter in the presence of God” (J. Escrivá, The Way, Point 266).

Point 177 says, “Don't waste the opportunity of yielding your own judgment” (J. Escriva, The Way, Point 177).

We don't go in spiritual direction to tell our spiritual director what we want to hear, or what he or she should tell us. If we're completely sincere when we ask for advice or when seeking guidance in some moral matter, then we come out with the right answers.

It may have to do with professional ethics, or judging before God whether we should have a larger family. If we are humble, if we recognize our own limitations, we will feel the need to seek this sort of advice at particular times.

We ought not simply to go to the first person we meet. In Friends of God, Point 86, it says,”We go to a person with the right qualities, to someone who wants to love God as sincerely as we do and who tries to follow him faithfully. It's not enough just to ask anyone for their opinion. We must go to a person who can give us sound and disinterested advice.”

“As we go through life, we find ourselves coming across people who are objective and know how to weigh things up, who don't get heated or try to tip the balance towards that which favors them. Almost instinctively, we find ourselves trusting such people, because, unassumingly and quietly, they act in a good and upright manner (J. Escrivá, Friends of God, Point 88).

St. John tells us, “He who follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life” (John 8:12).

What a wonderful thing to have the light of life! If we try to follow Our Lord each day of our life, we won't be wanting in the light of the Holy Spirit at every moment. If we're upright in our intention, He won't allow us to fall into error.

The Mother of Good Counsel will win for us the graces we need if we have recourse to her with the humility of those who know that on their way, they will often stumble and lose their way. She will look after us and bring us back.

St. Paul says to those of Thessalonica, “Grace to you and peace from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.”

Spiritual direction can give us a great peace in our life, a reassurance that we're on the right track.

He says to the Thessalonians, “We are bound to give thanks to God always for you, brethren, as is fitting, because your faith is growing abundantly, and the love of every one of you for one another is increasing” (2 Thess. 1:2-3).

Thanks to the Holy Spirit's help, the first Christians benefitted from the self-sacrificed vigilance of their pastors.

The Pharisees, by contrast, were unable to guide the Chosen People effectively because, through their own fault, they remained in darkness, and laid upon the children of Israel a hard and heavy burden, one which, moreover, didn't lead them to God.

St. Matthew quotes Our Lord calling the Pharisees “blind guides” (Matt. 23:24), incapable of showing others the right path to follow.

One of the greatest graces we can get is to have someone who can guide us along the pathways of the interior life. If you don't have somebody yet, ask Our Lord for it now, because “everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened” (Matt. 7:8).

God will not fail to give us this great gift. God provides us with a person who knows the way well, to whom we can open our hearts: a person who can act as a teacher, a doctor, a friend, a good shepherd in the things that relate to God.

That person will point out to us the possible obstacles and invite us to strive higher in our interior life, or to fight on specific points more effectively.

They will help us to get to know ourselves. Socrates gave the advice to people, “Know thyself.” Sometimes our pride blinds us from knowing ourselves. We need the objective input from somebody else.

Thanks to that spiritual director’s help, we are continually encouraged to keep going. We all need encouragement. St. Paul in his writing says, “Keep encouraging one another” (1 Thess. 5:11). We don't just need encouragement once a year. We need it every week, maybe more frequently.

We discover new horizons. Our soul is roused to a hunger and thirst for God which lukewarmness, always lurking nearby, would like to quench.

From the earliest times, the Church has always recommended the practice of spiritual direction as a very effective means of making progress in our interior life, because it is very difficult for any person to be their own guide.

Very often, the impulses of our nature, the lack of objectivity with which we see ourselves, our self-love, the tendency to be drawn to what we like most or what we find easiest to do—all these can tend to obscure the path, even though at the beginning it was perhaps very clear.

When that happens, we can get bogged down, and we can get discouraged, and we can become lukewarm.

St. John of the Cross says, “A soul without a director is like a kindled coal, which, left by itself, cools instead of burning. He who insists on being left to himself, without a director to guide him, is like an unowned tree by the wayside; however fruitful it may be, the travelers pick its fruit, and none of it ripens” (St. John of the Cross, The Living Flame of Love.

In spiritual direction, one needs a lot of common sense and a great supernatural outlook. For this reason, another writer says “one does not confide in just anyone, but in someone who deserves trust either because of what he or she is or because of the position in which God has placed them in relation to us” (Federico Suárez, Mary of Nazareth).

For St. Paul, the person chosen by God was Ananias, who strengthened him during his conversion (Acts 9:10-19).

For Tobias, it was the Archangel Raphael in human form, who was entrusted by God to guide him and counsel him in his long journey (Tob. 5:4-22).

Spiritual direction needs to have a supernatural environment if it’s to be effective; it is God's voice that we are listening for.

In matters that have to do with the soul, you have to identify in prayer the person who for us can be the good shepherd, because, as another writer says, “if we consider the matter for merely human motives we run the risk of not being understood; and then our joy becomes bitterness, and the bitterness becomes misunderstanding. Then we feel uneasy; we feel uncomfortable because we have talked too much to the wrong person about the wrong matter” (F. Suárez, Mary of Nazareth).

We need to have a supernatural attitude in spiritual direction if we’re to avoid looking around for the sort of advice that fits in with our own whims, advice that would drown out, with its apparent authority, the voice of our soul.

Especially to be avoided is the tendency to keep changing advisors uuntil we find the most “benevolent one” (J. Escrivá, Conversations, Point 93).

This is a temptation that can occur especially in more sensitive areas: whenever sacrifice is called for, in things that perhaps we’re not prepared to change, in the attempt to adapt God's Will to our own will: possibly, on discovering a vocation that calls for a greater degree of self-giving; or having to abandon an undesirable friendship; or, in the case of married people, being ready to have many children.

We can have recourse to Our Lady and ask her to help us to be constant in the work of our soul's direction, and to be sincere, opening our hearts completely, and docile, like “clay in the hands of the potter” as we’re told in the Book of Jeremiah (Jer. 18:1-6).

Our Holy Mother Mary will always show us the safe path that leads to her Son.

I thank you, my God, for the good resolutions, affections, and inspirations that you have communicated to me during this meditation. I ask your help to put them into practice. My Immaculate Mother, Saint Joseph, my father and lord, my guardian angel, intercede for me.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

MML