Discernment of Spirits, part 1

https://people.creighton.edu/~rjh98250/pix/Hauser_Richardtweb.jpgThe course I have most been looking forward to taking is The Discernment of Spirits with Fr Richard Hauser, SJ. He's written books on the subject and is quite well renowned. He's close to retirement and I was hoping I'd get to do it  with him.

The discernment of spirits might at first sound like a bit of an occult, seance & ouija board kind of thing. But it's actually a key part of Ignatian (Jesuit) spirituality. It's the way to make decisions, to choose in accord with what God wants for my life.

But before getting into the more complex and technical version of discernment which Ignatius gives in his Spiritual Exercises, Fr Richard taught us his own, simplified version from a book he's written, Moving in the Spirit. 

The key to discernment of spirits is being able to recognise and name my own emotional responses. This is also the first element of emotional intelligence. Hauser uses the term mood rather than emotion. Once I can name my mood, I name what I feel like doing, eg, I'm feeling excited so I want go 'woo-hoo' out loud, I'm feeling sad so I want to withdraw and be on my own, I'm angry and I want to kick something.

I then determine whether or not this action would be concordant with a desire to love and serve God and people. If it is, I call it a good mood. If not, I call it a bad mood. If it's a good mood then I can go ahead with my inclination. If it is a bad mood, then I need to recognise it as such, and deliberately substitute a good desire for the bad mood, and both act with the good desire for now, and take the bad mood to prayer later to deal with it.

It's not as obvious as 'happiness is good, anger and sadness are bad'. Eg, in the examples above I might be excited and happy that I'm going on holidays tomorrow, but if I'm at a funeral at the time, shouting out won't be a loving action. If the sadness causes me to withdraw and pray, and think, and I'm free to do so, it's a good thing. If I'm angry and I feel like assertively dealing with an injustice (as long as it is truly an injustice and not just me feeling slighted) then that's a good mood.

Of course most of us do this a dozen times a day; we go to work even when we're tired, we bite our tongue when we're grumpy etc. But giving it language helps me to recognise it so that I do it more often. And taking the bad moods back to prayer is different from just pushing it down. It allows us to notice patterns and to ask God help deal with things in us which keep resurfacing.

Our assignment last week was to name a bad mood we experienced in the past week and to describe the process we took to deal with it (whether we acted well or not), making reference to the process in the book. It was amazing that once I noticed and named a bad mood from early in the week I then noticed that I had the same bad mood a few more times, and was able to go to God in prayer to deal with it. I've worked against that potential bad mood this week and noticed the difference in myself.

 

Comments

  1. Raenor24 June 2017 at 19:01

    Hi Father Jim,
    Thanks for sharing Fr Richard Hauser's course with us. Isn't it amazing how a person can instinctively react, without actually discerning and then find that it's all good. Good to try to get to the bottom of our odd reactions to different situations and how to deal with them. I love it and look forward to hearing more if you get the chance. My daughter Kristen is really interested in your course, she is aware of Fr Richard's work and can't believe how blessed you are.
    Loved the cloud picture - how incredible!!
    Warm regards, Raenor and Ray

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Fr Jim McKeon5 July 2017 at 16:35

      Dear Raenor, it's interesting that Kristen is aware of Fr Hauser, as I would not have known about him before coming to Creighton. It is a good exercise to reflect on ourselves and discover what fuels our reactions, not all of which are conscious. God bless - Jim

      Delete
  2. Dominic25 June 2017 at 14:21

    Thanks Mate,
    I can see that this is a great strategy for dealing with our implicit biases. So often we just feel certain things but don't explore whether they are positive loving bias or destructive hateful biases.
    Today when I read Matthew's gospel 5:1-7 it was talking about the log in our own eyes that stops us from loving ourselves as God loves us.
    We are certainly complex beings.
    Cheers my friend Dominic

    ReplyDelete

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