The Dynamism of Desire: Bernard J. F. Lonergan, SJ, on The Spiritual Exercises of Saint Ignatius of Loyola (review)

Given the attractiveness of its title, why exactly does this book become so unsatisfying? About half-way through my reading, the picture that came to mind was of two decks of cards, each of a different size, being shuffled together. The combined decks make dealing awkward. A book exploring the theological anthropology underlying the Spiritual Exercises could have been illuminating; or a book exploring foundational issues in Christian spirituality, drawing on Lonergan, would have been interesting. But here Lonergan and the Exercises do not come together in an integrated way. Perhaps the book suffers from being produced by a committee, arising as it did from the joint reflection of the Fellows at The Woodstock Theological Center in Washington, D.C. Multiple authorship might explain some of the repetition, although the book does not betray the sound of multiple voices. Or perhaps the group, having worked out an isomorphism between the strategy of the Exercises and Lonergan's cognitional theory, suspects that Ignatius would have been a Lonerganian.

"No more helpful contemporary commentator on and expositor of the Exercises could be found than Bernard Lonergan," we are told in the Foreword. I have had the chance to study Lonergan's work, and I believe there is genius in it. Indeed, many of us are indebted to him for having made sense of the scholastic theory of knowledge that was our gateway into the world of philosophy. Yet it never occurred to me to turn to him in order to understand the dynamic of the Exercises. Most people who study the Exercises are more likely to turn first to Michael Ivens' 1998 commentary Understanding the Spiritual Exercises. I like to think that Fr. Lonergan would have winced at the following paraphrase of the Ignatian preparatory prayer:

God grant me the grace to be aware of the spontaneous movements within my consciousness, all those urges, drives, intentions you create within my spirit to carry me forward toward authenticity and self-transcendence. Let me follow them faithfully. In the planning and execution of every decision in my life, let me be attentive, intelligent, reasonable, and responsible. Let me be attentive to the data of my consciousness; let me be open to wonder, eager to inquire and understand; let me be critical in verifying the accuracy of the judgments I make; and let me be conscientious in deliberating and responsible in choosing only what is good and worthwhile. Let my openness and willingness be pure, detached, disinterested and unrestricted. Amen.

(96)

And he might have wondered about statements such as, "Authentic Christianity might have remained an unattainable ideal had not Jesus demonstrated its possibility" (226). Or, "Well, the human perfection that Christ reached could have been something altogether different from the perfection he actually acquired" (290).

In Lonergan's cognitional theory, human knowing unfolds on four levels—the level of experience, the level of inquiry and understanding, the level of judgment, and the level of decision-making. Corresponding to each of the levels four basic imperatives emerge: be attentive, be intelligent, be reasonable, and be responsible. Fidelity to these imperatives, which are imposed on us by the fact that we are rational beings, leads to authenticity. The fully human and truly authentic human person, therefore, is one who is attentive, intelligent, reasonable, and responsible. Core desire starts out as the desire to know; as it matures, this desire becomes increasingly the desire to know God. Since human beings are made not just to know but also to love—and to express their love in deeds—desire orients the human person both to knowing and to loving, to being known and to being loved. And, finally, since we are by nature social beings, desire does not unfold in isolation from community. The human being's desire to understand, to act responsibly, and to know...