Published in: The Lord of Friendship – Friendship, Discernment and Mission in Ignatian Spirituality, edited by Jacques Haers SJ, Hans van Leeuwen SJ, Mark Rotsaert SJ and Mary Blickmann, 2011 Way Books, Oxford, 58-78.

Original Dutch edition De Heer van de vriendschap, NV Uitgeverij Altiora, Averbode 2006.

Friendshipin the Spiritual Exercises

andthe Constitutions ofthe Society of Jesus

Peter Knauer

Kinder werfen den Ball an die Wand und fangen ihn

wieder;

Aber ich lobe das Spiel, wirft mir der Freund ihn

zurück

(Goethe)[1]

On 24 July 1557, Ignatius wrote to Joan de Verdolay, someonewhom he knew .and trusted, in Barcelona. He told him thatin mid-January of that year, nine of his ‘friends in the Lord’ hadmet him in Venice: ‘ they all have their MA degrees and are quitewell versed in theology. Four of them are Spaniards, two French,two from Savoy, and one from Portugal.’[2]Ignatius is referring tothe companions who were to found a religious order, the Societyof Jesus, together with him a few years later in 1539. Already inParis in 1535. they had made vows of poverty and chastity in achapel on Montmartre hill, and undertaken to travel to the HolyLand—or, if this were not to be possible, to place themselves at the disposal of the Pope in Rome for missions. In 1544, DiegoLaínez, writing to Juan de Polanco, described how this groupwere living together during their time in Paris, at the point whenthev were renewing these vows for the first time one year onfrom making them. After the renewal.

[59]... we stayed there for an agape. This we continued throughoutthe year. For at intervals of however many days, we used togo with our own food to eat in one person's house, and then on another occasion in another's—which, along with ourfrequent mutual visits and conversing with each other, I think helped greatly to hold us together. And it was just atthis time that the Lord helped us especially, both in the studyof letters, in which we made proper progress by orientatingthem always to the Lord's honour and our neighbour's profit and in our holding each other in a special love, also helping each other to the extent we could in matters temporal.[3]

Pierre Favre described the beginning of his friendship with Ignatius in similar terms. In his spiritual journal, known as the Memoriale, he writes of how the master in charge of the students, Juan de la Peña, had put him in touch with Ignatius:

Eternally blessed be divine providence who arranged this for my good and for my salvation. For once it was so arranged ... that I was to be the instructor of that holy man, I sought out conversation with him on outward matters, and then indeed on interior things. For since we were living together in the same room, at the same table and out of the same purse, and since it was he who became my teacher in spiritual things, offering a way of ascent into the knowledge of the divine will and of one's own self, we finally became one in desires and in will, with a firm decision to choose this way of life that we now have, whoever we are and whoever we will be at any time in this Society, of which I am not worthy.[4]

Friendship arises through people getting to know each other, gaining trust in each other, and helping each other. From the mutual friendship of Ignatius of Loyola's companions sprang the religious order we know as the Society of Jesus.

What follows names the places where the Spiritual Exercises and the Constitutions of the Society of Jesus refer to the idea of friendship, and offers some commentary on them with the help of further Ignatian texts.

[60>]Friendship in the Spiritual Exercises

Perhaps it is out of experiences of friendship such as those just mentioned that Ignatius, in the First Week of the Spiritual Exercises, describes the first ‘colloquy’ at the end of a meditation, the so-called ‘colloquy of mercy’ (Exx 53), as follows:

The colloquy is made speaking personally, as one friend speaks to another, or as a servant to his master; now asking some grace, now blaming oneself for some misdeed, now communicating one’s business and wanting advice about it.

The relationship grounding this kind of a conversation at the end of a meditation is like the one we find in Psalm 23, ‘The Lord is my shepherd’: we start with an objective statement about God being a shepherd and the person being led, and then as pass over into trustful address: ‘You are with me’.

Even clearer is Ignatius' use of the image of friendship in the Fourth Week ofSpiritual Exercises to indicate the encounter with the risen Lord:

... to consider the office of consoling which Christ our Lord brings, and comparing how friends are accustomed to console friend (Exx 224).

‘Console’- is a rich word for Ignatius. ‘Consolation’ for him primarily describes God’s dealings with the human person. After all, in the hymn Veni sancte Spiritus, the Holy Spirit is addressed as consolator optime, ‘thou of all consolers best’. ‘Consoler’ is also one ofthe possible translations of the word scripture uses to name the Holy Spirit: paraklētos —a word that can also mean ‘advocate’ or ‘helper’. God fills the human heart with joy, courage, assurance and, in a good sense, self-confidence. Ignatius takes friendship as an image for this kind of divine action in humanity. Friendship indeed consists in the ‘office ofconsoling’. And the fact that Christ ‘brings’ this office signifies that he is also empowering others for it. For Ignatius, this is the risen one’s gift The passage just quoted says much about Ignatius’ idea of thehuman person. He sees the deepest human fulfillment as coming through friendship which consists in trustful mutual presence.

The beginning of the Contemplation to Attain Love, too clearly starts out from the experience of friendship, even if here [61>] the word 'friendship' is not expressly used (though the Spanish word for 'friend', amigo, has its root in amar, ‘to love’:

First, it is well to remark two things: the first is that love ought to be put more in deeds than in words.

The second, love consists in interchange between the two parties; that is to say in the lover's giving and communicating to the beloved what he has or out of what he has or can; and so, the other way round, the beloved to the lover. So that if the one has knowledge, they give it to the one who does not have it. The same of honours, of riches; and so the one to the other. (Exx 230-231)

Friendship is being understood as a mutual love in which people engage all the good gifts they have for the benefit of one another.

Ultimately, indeed, what is at stake is the kind of mutual commitment that the Contemplation to Attain Love attributes expressly to God. With great love, one should ponder,

... how much God our Lord has done for me, and how much He has given me of what He has, and further how likewisethe same Lord, according to His divine ordination, is desiring to give me Himself as much as He can (Exx 234).

The mutual giving of gifts here is grounded on things of positive value. This might seem surprising, because in the Principle foundation we were exhorted to indifference regarding good things in the world:

... on our part, therefore, we should not want health more than sickness, riches than poverty, honour than dishonour, a long life than a short one, and so on with everything else— only desiring and choosing what leads us more towards the end for which we are created (Exx 23).

But it appears that the Contemplation to Attain Love unambiguously is knowledge, honour and riches as better than their contraries. It is only these that people are meant to impart to each other.

However, the indifference of the Principle and Foundation is in fact in no way disputing the proper value of things, but only the tendency to hold on them at any price. Moreover, just as happiness [62>] only increases when it is spread, so a problem shared is a problem halved. The mutual imparting in the Contemplation to Attain Love may therefore also include a sharing of sorrows—obviously not so as to increase them but rather to relieve them. What is so astonishing in mutual friendship is that we suffer no loss when we lovingly share our property and ourselves with each other.

Elsewhere in the Spiritual Exercises there may be more muted references to friendship: in the Annotations at the beginning, in the description of ‘the one who gives the exercises’; in the so-called Presupposition (Exx 22); and finally in some of the meditations on the ‘Mysteries of the Life of Christ our Lord’.

The second Annotation says that the one giving the exercises should help the exercitant work with his or her own resources on the matter of the meditation. This will be,

... of more spiritual relish and fruit, than if the one giving the Exercises had much explained and amplified the meaning of the story. For it is not knowing much that contents and satisfies the soul, but feeling and tasting things from inside.

One might read the wish to promote another's own development and awareness here as expressing no more than a concern about successful teaching. But it could also reflect a morebenevolent, ‘'friendlier’, style of relationship. For the talk of the soul’s being contented and satisfied is only another way of naming what Ignatius regularly calls ‘consolation’.

The 'Presupposition' (Exx 22) runs:

In order that both the one who is giving the Spiritual Exercises and the one who is receiving them may get more help and benefit, let it be presupposed that all good Christians must to be more ready to save their neighbour’s proposition than to condemn it. If they cannot save it, let them inquire how ihe other means it; and if he or she means it badly, let them correct him or her with charity. If that is not enough, let them seek all the suitable means to bring the other to mean it well, and save himself or herself.

Here too the text is dealing with how friends relate to each other: a readiness to listen, to enquire, to encourage each other, and in all cases to deal with each other lovingly. What is said here every‘good Christian’ in fact applies already to any good human [63>] being. The self is seen as being in dialogue; a person should be open to the possibility of experiencing from another something that contributes to his or her own salvation. The implied contrast is with a monologue, a solipsistic self-understanding, where all that one expects from other people is confirmation of what one already knows from one's own resources.

In the ‘Mysteries of the Life of Christ our Lord’, the main thing to note is the repeated mention of ‘beloved disciples’: Jesus advises them to use their talents (Exx 278), and calls and sends them, teaching them about prudence and patience (Exx 281). In the presentation of the Transfiguration, Ignatius says that Jesus was ‘taking along in his company his beloved disciples Peter, James and John’ (Exx 284). The tasks given to the disciples presuppose that they and Jesus are in a relationship of mutual trustfulness that is fundamentally one of friendship.

The word ‘friend’ is also used in a problematic sense, when we are told that Pilate and Herod ‘were made friends, who before were enemies’ (Exx 295). Here it refers to a solidarity in working against another person.

Friendship in the Constitutions

The Constitutions of the Society of Jesus are concerned with how the spirit of the Exercises can take flesh.[5] The first thing we notice, perhaps rather to our surprise, is that the Constitutions never explicitly speak of a ‘friendship’ as such between members of the Society. The Examen warns against such things as leaving money with ‘'friends’ outside the Society (4.4[57]). It also notes the problems that can arise if a person maintains excessively strong ties with relatives or friends outside the Society (4.6 [60]; I.1.4 [143]; see also III. 1.B [246]). On the other hand, there are also references to the need to cultivate friends for the Society (IV. 10. C [426]), and there are to be prayers for ‘friends and benefactors, living and dead’ (VII.4.3 [6381). There may also be a warning against ‘particular friendships’, which are a caricature of true friendship, inside the Society:

[64>]One who is seen to be a cause of division among those who live together, estranging them either among themselves or from their head, ought with great diligence to be separated from that community, as a pestilence which can infect it seriously if a remedy is not quickly applied. (VIII. 1.5 [664]).

[64>]But although there is no express talk of mutual friendship between members of the Society, a whole range of texts imply such a friendship, or at least a style of relating that could grow into friendship. Unless such a union of hearts is present, no religious order will last long, and certainly not one that could properly call itself a ‘company of Jesus’.

Ignatius and the group of his ‘friends in the Lord’ from Paris had originally intended, as has already been mentioned, to travel to the HolvLand, to visit the holy places and probably to dedicate themselves to conversations with Muslims. In the event of there being no possibility of making the passage, they had an alternative plan of going to Rome and asking the Pope to send them wherever thev could best serve the Church: this story is set out in a Declaration (VII. 1.B [605]). When this eventuality had occurred and the Pope had accepted their offer, the question arose as to whether they were now to be scattered to the four winds, and forced to abandon their common way of life. The group addressed these questions in a series of evening meetings, the upshot of which has come down to us in the so-called Deliberation of the First Fathers:

At the meeting on the first night, the following question was opened up: given that we had offered and dedicated ourselves and our lives to Christ our Lord and to his true and legitimate vicar on earth so that he might dispose of us and send us wherever he judged it to be more fruitful, whether to ... the Indies[6]or to heretics or to others of the faithful or pagans—given that, would it or would it not be more advantageous for our purpose to be so joined and bound together in one body that no physical distance, no matter how great, would separate us?

[65>]The issue can be made clear by a case. The Pope is sending two of us to the city of Siena. Ought we to he concerned aboutthose who are going to that place or they about us? And ought we to have a mutual understanding of this concern? Or should we have no more concern for them than we have for those who are not in this Company?

Finally, we decided affirmatively, as follows: inasmuch as our most kind and affectionate Lord had deigned to gather us together and unite us, men so weak and from such diverse geographical and cultural backgrounds, we ought not to split apart God's uniting and gathering; on the contrary, we ought day by day to strengthen and stabilise our union, rendering ourselves one body with special concern for and understanding of each other for a greater fruit of souls—and also since that united strength would be more effective and lasting in the pursuit of any difficult good than if it were dispersed in several directions.[7]

Scripture uses the image of the body to refer to the Church; here it is applied to what will become the Society of Jesus. This Society is a community for dispersion (ad dispersionem): ‘After all. in the future we must, in conformity with our profession and manner of proceeding, always be ready to be travelling about in various regions of the world’ (Examen 4.35(92]).

Such dispersion across many areas seems to work against union. But just this union, however wide the ‘physical distance’, is not only to be maintained but also to be deepened.They see it as important to know about each other, to bother about each other, and to be concerned about each other. Moreover, in all this, the first companions are wanting to respond to their experiential conviction of their community having been brought together by God. They are wanting to cooperate with this grace of God. The point will later be repeated in the Constitutions. In the Preamble, we read:

Although it must be the Supreme Wisdom and Goodness ofGod our Creator and Lord which will preserve, direct, andcarry forward in His divine service this least Society of Jesus,just as He deigned to begin it; and although what helps moston our own part toward this end must be, more than any[66>]exterior constitution, the interior law of charity and love which the Holy Spirit writes and engraves upon hearts; nevertheless, since the gentle arrangement of Divine Providence requires cooperation from His creatures, and since too the Vicar of Christ our Lord has ordained this, and since the exaples given by the saints and reason itself teach us so in our Lord, we think it necessary that constitutions should be written to aid us to proceed [proceder] better, in conformity with our Institute, along the path [vía] of divine service on which we have entered. (Preamble 1 [134])