Double-edged mirrors - Chris Gleeson SJ
In 1967 I learned to drive a car in
what the Jesuit university scholastics affectionately called ‘the
chastity chariot’. It was a rather large Commer van, capable of seating
the twelve of us attending Melbourne University, all dressed up in our
clerical blacks and neck-chafing white collars. Every morning the
gatekeeper at Tin Alley would greet the driver with a nudge-nudge wink:
‘How’s the family, Father?’ It gave him his first, perhaps his only,
adrenalin rush for the day.
Not long after I received my driver’s licence, with Jesuit friend Des Dwyer chatting happily to the accrediting policeman in the back seat, I was asked to do a four night defensive driving course with the Brunswick Police. It was excellent value. There I learnt how to use my mirrors to maximise the safety of my vehicle and its passengers. Mirrors can save lives.
To another sort of mirror.
In mid-October I was privileged to be part of a ‘Companions’ conference, beautifully planned and organised by Stephanie and Wayne Brabin and their team in Adelaide. Companions is a professional association of lay people, Jesuits and other religious, who are accredited givers of the Spiritual Exercises of St Ignatius. Founded in the last few years by Michael Smith SJ, they have grown in strength as a network and now number nearly 100 members across Australia.
During the three days we were treated to some fine presentations by Canadian Jesuit, Monty Williams. He had been brought to Australia by our five centres of Ignatian spirituality to give us some professional development. That he certainly did in his provocative yet attractive and self-deprecating manner.
The auxiliary Bishop of Adelaide, Greg O’Kelly SJ, also gave us some thoughtful input one night on the ministry of giving the Exercises, as did Michael Smith in tracing our history as a professional association. Understanding that the field of spiritual formation can be open to practitioners of dubious quality, he emphasised the importance of observing the Companions’ code of ethics with its carefully formulated protocols for supervision and spiritual direction.
On the final morning of the conference there was an open forum giving participants the opportunity to evaluate the previous three days. One delegate waxed eloquent on the 140-year-old vines she had seen the previous day on our pilgrimage to Sevenhill, the cradle of the Society of Jesus in Australia. Another picked up on the opening conference prayer led by Sr Anne Noonan from Perth—‘deep calling on deep’ from Psalm 72. The comment that really struck home to me, however, was that this particular group of conference delegates was ‘a mirror of the church, or at least what the church should be’.
It took me back to those heady Theology days in Parkville, with John Wilcken SJ as our lecturer, when we were examining various models of the church. Luke’s description in Acts 2 has always appealed:
‘These remained faithful to the teaching of the apostles, to the brotherhood, to the breaking of bread and to the prayers. The many miracles and signs worked through the apostles made a deep impression on everyone. The faithful all lived together and owned everything in common; they sold their goods and possessions and shared out the proceeds among themselves according to what each one needed. They went as a body to the Temple every day but met in their houses for the breaking of bread; they shared their food gladly and generously; they praised God and were looked up to by everyone. Day by day the Lord added to their community those destined to be saved.’
How accurately that Adelaide Companions conference mirrored this model of church is open to conjecture, but it is clear that Companions is a true community, devoid of complex levels of authority, and united in our common ministry of providing the highest quality companionship to those undertaking the Spiritual Exercises of St Ignatius. Of course, Ignatius wrote the Exercises as a layman and bequeathed them to the whole church, not just the Jesuits. He would be delighted with the Companions’ initiative, which might well be mirroring how our church will look in the future by returning to its lay-led origins in the past.
Mirrors have another side to them
too
Indeed, some of us can spend inordinate time before mirrors, panel
beating and re-imagining our visage. When speaking at our Adelaide
conference about the place of sin in the first week of the Spiritual
Exercises, Monty Williams quipped, ‘for Ignatius, narcissism was the huge
sin’.
In mythology, Narcissus was the young man who fell in love with and became captivated by his own image reflected in a lake. That great saint, Teresa of Avila, once remarked that ‘it is absurd to think that we can enter heaven without first entering our own souls—without getting to know ourselves’. And if you want to know why we do not reach the intimacy of walking with the Lord in the cool of the evening, it is because we are unwilling to see ourselves as we are.
This is not a very popular idea in our post-modernist age of image, where spin predominates over substance, and where style—even lifestyle—is more important than searching for the truth. To quote an excellent newsletter article by the Dean of Students at Brisbane Girls Grammar School in June last year, ours is a ‘culture where narcissism has been repackaged and sold as normal’. We need constantly to return to those words in Samuel: ‘We look at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart’ (1 Samuel 16:7).
While inordinate use of the mirror might reveal a preoccupation with self-image, nonetheless all of us need a strong self-picture, a healthy self-esteem. After all, the Gospel enjoins us to love our neighbour as ourselves. Yet have we gone overboard on self-esteem? Is this the narcissism which, according to Monty Williams, Ignatius saw as ‘the huge sin’? Should we be focusing more on self-respect rather than self-esteem?
One thing is clear.
If self-esteem flows from a heartfelt knowledge of how much we are loved by God, it will not be the selfish narcissism, ‘the huge sin’ abhorred by St Ignatius. After all, we are told in Genesis 1:26 that we are a mirror, an ‘image of God’. That is our true spiritual identity.
Indeed, we need to hear again and again on our pilgrim’s journey those enchanting words of Isaiah: ‘You are precious in my eyes. You are honoured and I love you’ (Isaiah 43:4). That is our true mirror.
