The spiritual father helps you find the truth in your heart

The testimony of Silvio, 23, a university student

The spiritual father provides the same attention and care that a parent gives his child, but on the spiritual level. He gives you time whenever you need it most. He knows how to listen. You can confide everything to him and trust him blindly. Rather than giving good advice, he helps you find the truth in your heart. He makes sure that he does not become indispensable, because his goal is to teach you to walk on your own.

It was he who recommended the Spiritual Exercises to me. I had heard of them randomly and until a few months ago I had never seriously thought about undergoing this experience. I wanted to bring order into my life and needed answers or confirmations to a series of questions that I had been asking myself for some time, and which surfaced intensely during the lockdown. So, I trusted.

What struck me initially was the silence, interrupted only during moments of prayer, catechesis, and personal colloquies with the spiritual director. The rest of the time is spent in silence to be able to gradually silence the mind so that the subtle but powerful voices within the soul surface.

There are 4 to 5 one-hour prayer sessions during the day. Everything must be planned and prepared in advance: the passage to pray on, the place, and the time. Prayer must truly be like an exercise, which is carried out even when one is not in the mood or is tired; thus, we learn to live a faithful relationship with the Lord, an intimate relationship, and of constant dialogue. Our life on earth is measured by time: dedicating our time to God and to everyone we meet means giving our life to others!

Sometimes prayer seems a waste of time, because to silence the soul is even more difficult than to keep the body still and so distractions take over. At other times, however, you hear a word that strikes you, a thought, a memory, an intuition comes to light … And in a subtle and brief way God speaks to us.

There have been difficult days when I was finding it very hard to accept the way God was asking me to follow.

I have learned to be more generous with him: I ask him the questions which are of concern to me, but I listen to everything that he has to say. The more we let go and offer our life in its entirety to him, the greater the fruit to be reaped in the end.

On the last day, when the silence was broken, all of us who participated in the Exercises exploded with joy: the smiles, the laughter, the words we expressed were full of serenity, of gratitude, of a renewed courage to face the future.

I entered this experience full of doubts and returned with a deeper knowledge of my desires, with confidence in the help of the Lord and aware of my neighbour’s freedom, a boundary that neither God nor I can cross.

I recommend this experience to all those who are seeking God, who desire to meet Him, who are thirsty for His word. When you are in need, it’s nice to have a friend to help us, but true friends don’t wait until they have a problem to show up!

For more information on Spiritual Exercises visit the Centre for Ignatian Spirituality website