Highlights of the Spiritual Exercises of St Ignatius for busy people seeking nourishment and clarity.
Are you looking for a deeper prayer life and to discover the desires God has for you? The full Spiritual Exercises of St Ignatius provide an invaluable and time-tested framework for a powerful, life-changing encounter with God; however sometimes it can be difficult to make the full Exercises in 30 days of silence or over 30 weeks in daily life.
If this is the case for you, we invite you to experience key exercises from all four parts of the Spiritual Exercises over four months in these Concise Spiritual Exercises.
Offered in Pymble NSW.
How it works – The Concise Spiritual Exercises are a four-month in-person program based in Pymble NSW which includes, each month: a retreat day, daily prayer, and online spiritual accompaniment. We suggest that one or more of the monthly retreats days be extended to two days if possible. There is also a final spiritual accompaniment session to conclude.
You can also experience the Concise Spiritual Exercises in an 8-Day residential retreat with an introductory spiritual direction session beforehand.
Prior experience – Before undertaking the Concise Spiritual Exercises, we recommend that you have experience in regular Ignatian spiritual direction/accompaniment and a silent Ignatian retreat of at least two days.
Price – $1195 includes four retreat days at Peter Canisius House in Pymble, study space, Wi-Fi, prayer material, use of facilities and grounds, parking, refreshments, lunch, all spiritual direction sessions at JISA Canisius and online.
Enquiries and bookings: Email info@jisa.org.au or Phone 1300 392 636
Read Michael’s experience of the Concise Spiritual Exercises:
An option for people with busy lives
For over 15 years I had desired to undertake the Spiritual Exercises, but it seemed more of a ‘life bucket list’ type desire that was very difficult to undertake with a full-time job and young children, using my annual holiday to go on a silent retreat. It seemed to ask a lot, not of me so much but of my wife who’d be literally left holding the baby!
Then I discovered the Concise Spiritual Exercises offered out of Canisius. This format is designed to fit into a retreatant’s life routine. Not as good an experience as going away on retreat but better than not doing it at all.
In this mode, each ‘Week’ of the Exercises takes about a month. It starts with a full day on a weekend and then continues with a structured hour of daily prayer at home, five to six days a week. There was no need for me to use up any of my annual leave, all I had to do was stick to the habit of getting up on time for that ‘holy hour’.
All up, the Concise Exercises involved about 120 hours of time in prayer, compared to, I believe, around 160 hours for the full 30-day retreat. Because it was all done at home, the retreat was also a tiny fraction of the cost of the live-in version.
It was very gratifying to finally be able to complete the Exercises, before I heard about this course, I believed the 30-day retreat was something I’d only be able to do in retirement. I recommend it for anyone who also feel drawn to undertake the full Exercises but like me, assumed it to be impractical at their stage in life.
A big thanks to my retreat director, Guy Yeomans and to JISA for working to make the Exercises more accessible.
Michael Walker
Written by Michael Walker, President of Christian Life Community (CLC) Australia