[B.] St. IGNATIUS of LOYOLA Presentation: The ... - St. Gaspar Bertoni

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k. The definitive vocation of the Christian is not death, but the Joy of the
Resurrection of the Lord, the recognition of the divinity through the glorious body of Jesus,
in the manifestation of His Wounds [cf. Jn 20]. Jesus, as God’s only begotten, most beloved
Son, establishes the New Creation. This is a new relationship of that same love that unites Jesus
with His Father, through the Holy Spirit. This agape’ is communicated, shared with the
baptized, the consecrated into Christ Jesus - in the form of love and fidelity in the Risen Christ.
All of the believers are being called to become more and more children of the most High, sharing
in Jesus’ own Filiation, by participation in the glorious life of the Risen Lord. This is kept alive
through the Contemplation toward Love.
4. The Structure of Ignatius’ Text:
a. The very brief document of the Fourth Week of the Spiritual Exercises, as
these result from the pen of St. Ignatius, is composed of three basic elements, and their subdivisions:
- the appearance of the Risen Lord to Our Lady [cf. SE, ## 218-220];
- three considerations that guide the contemplation:
- the petition for the grace of the Fourth Week [cf.SE #221];
- the divine showing of His Divinity [SE # 224];
- the office of “Consoler” Who permeates the Risen One [SE # 224].
- the four “Notes” which really, of their nature, pertain to the interior and practical running
of the Spiritual Exercises - but, these offer fruit from any careful reflecting upon them.
b. From this “structure” the student may note those basic points, that fundamental
orbit, within which the contemplation of the retreatant should gravitate. This appearance to Our
Lady fulfills a paradigmatic function. Then, the complementarity of the three considerations [cf.
SE ## 221; 223;224] guide and center the attention of the very ultimate meaning of the
Resurrection in the life of the Church. These few elements are those which offer the key of
Ignatius; own understanding of this Encounter with the Crucified, Who is now Risen. The
Contemplation toward Love leads to a hope-filled APOSTOLIC MISSION.
299].
1.] The Appearance of the Risen Lord to Our Lady [cf. SE ## 218-225;
a.] For this non-biblical scene with all probability St. Ignatius had as
his source The Life of Christ, by Ludolf of Saxony, ‘the Carthusian’, who speaks of just such an
apparition. For both writers, Jesus’ appearance after His Resurrection to His Mother is the very
first such encounter for Him, and both treat of it in the same way, in ’explaining away’ the silence
of the Scriptures in this regard.
[1] “The Carthusian” explains the appearance and the
reason for Scripture’s silence as follows: He appeared to her at the very outset of His glory.
Jesus Christ came to her, her most beloved Son, dressed in the brilliant white of His glorious
refulgence. This vesture represented the habit of the lasting glory and the dignity of His new
Resurrection. And then that King of kings conducted the report on how He had gone down to the
nether-world and how He had emptied that infernal prison of those faithful ones who had awaited
Him.
[2] With just such an admirable appearance, the Prince of
Glory, it is piously believed, came to the glorious Virgin. Nothing about this is recorded in the holy
Gospel, but it is believed that He conducted this as the first of His appearances. It is simply basic
piety that it should have been thus. This seems implied in the readings of the subsequent
appearances of the Risen One.