OF TWO KNIGHTS
Our first knight is fictional: a strange old gentleman named Alonso Quijano. Having been inflamed with passion for knight errantry by reading books of chivalry, he took the name Don Quixote de la Mancha and, donning a rusted suit of armor and mounting an old nag for a warhorse, sallied forth from his little town to perform brave feats of arms across Spain. His mad misadventures with his faithful squire Sancho Panza continue to attract and delight many readers the world over.
Our second is real and cuts no less an odd figure than the ingenious gentleman of La Mancha. He was a dashing young man by the name of Iñigo Lopez de Oñaz y Loyola. Once a courtier and soldier, much like Don Quixote, he was dizzied by the thoughts of honor and fame, of the fortunes of war and great deeds of courage. His dreams, however, would soon be dashed. Defending the fortress of Pamplona from the French, his leg was shattered by round shot and he spent many painful weeks convalescing in the castle of Loyola.
As with Quixote, his soul was inflamed by reading, but unlike our first knight, it was not by romances and books of chivalry that his life was changed completely. Having picked up a book on the Life of Christ and another on the life of saints, he would give up his armor and weapons, and would now serve not an earthly King, but a Divine one. Ignatius (as he would eventually be called), would answer the call of this Christ in a manner that would echo throughout the centuries.
Both seemed mad to the world. We remember the mad Don Quixote most famously for tilting at windmills (and failing comically and miserably). But Ignatius, too, tilted at windmills, and more. For his mad adventures would not be confined to the countryside of Spain; the quest would draw him to Montserrat and Manresa, to the Holy Land and Barcelona, to Paris and Venice and to so many other places, and then to Rome, where he would finally be laid to rest. His quest continues in the thousands of brothers and sisters who make up the Ignatian family, who daily embark on mad adventures of their own.
Our two knights may seem mad, but to them, their adventures made complete and perfect sense. For what may seem to be insanity to us “practical” people is to the lover nothing less than sanity, perhaps the only sane thing in the world: to follow that love to the ends of the earth, and to see all the world through the lens of this love. This love made sense of everything they did, no matter how ridiculous or risible it seemed to others. Don Quixote’s honorable and gallant love of Dulcinea made of her a true lady of honor and made a fine romance of his mad and risible adventures. Ignatius’ honorable and gallant love of the Lord inflamed so many others for love and service in all things. In the madness of these two knights, we see how great a change one helps bring about in one’s self, in others, and in the world, when the world is seen not just as it is, but as it should be, charged with splendor though beset by many ills.
Don Quixote’s most famous song speaks of the impossible dream – to strive and fight against seemingly insurmountable odds in following the quest. Impossible, but for human strength alone. Ignatius the dreamer had one thing over Quixote the dreamer, for his strength lay in the depth of his experience of the overflowing and self-giving love and grace of his King. How much the gift of this love and grace makes the impossible possible can be seen in his radical prayer of self-offering, the Suscipe.
THE DREAMER’S SUSCIPE
The Suscipe is found in the Fourth Week of Ignatius’ Spiritual Exercises. It famously starts with the words, “Take, Lord, receive all my liberty, my memory, understanding, my entire will.”
It seems to demand too much of ourselves to surrender everything, especially what we hold most dear as part of our selves. In particular, letting go of our liberty, our will to choose our own destinies, feels just too much, just too costly, just too inhuman. On the other hand, it may be that this radical self-offering becomes a source of pride – that we deserve God’s gratitude and favor because we are ready to offer anything, even our very selves.
But it is not self-destruction and loss of everything, on one hand, or the privilege of self-offering, on the other, that takes center stage in this Suscipe. The relationship with God that is broadened and deepened in the Exercises is not a transactional one, and God is not a vending machine of graces. This prayer is said in the context of the Contemplatio ad Amorem, the Contemplation to Attain the Love of God, and it is the love of God that must shine through in this radical prayer of self-offering.
In the context of this contemplation, Ignatius invites the exercitant to ponder the “gift-ness” of all things, of having come from God and given in a personal and intimate manner to the exercitant out of his eternal love. It is this same self-giving love which the exercitant has experienced in its breadth and depth throughout the four weeks of the Exercises, and so the contemplation becomes a synthesis of what has gone before. And in recognizing everything as gift, one is inflamed in gratitude to give all back, precisely because of its “gift-ness”. Robert Marsh,SJ, in reflecting on the contemplation, summarizes it beautifully: “The outcome of the labour of gratitude is that we become like the giver of the gift: that I think is the real grace of the Contemplatio—to let ourselves be made over by gratitude into the likeness of God. To become givers as God is giver, lovers as God is lover.”
It is the gracious love of God, shown more in words than deeds (SpEx #230), and that consists in a mutual sharing of goods (231), that allows what seems to be a great burden to be borne and to keep us humble in making this offering. It is only this love which has shown itself to be forgiving, personal, and self-giving, and thus something trustworthy and credible, that can demand and ask of so great a sacrifice from ourselves.
It is only by recognizing, “with great affection” the God who “has done much for me” (234), the God who has given me life (235), the God who labors for me in all creation (236), and who gives me all blessings and gifts (237), that this prayer makes sense and becomes fruitful. For I can only share what I am because of the God who has loved me first. I can only throw away everything, because I can fling myself into the arms of One who is Love, and who continues to love me, desiring only what is good for me, and what will bring me to him. I can give up everything, because I know the One who holds everything in his hands. I know the One whom I love in all things, and in whom I can also love all things.
Looked at with the eyes of this radical and costly Love of God, our own self-offering becomes less of a loss and more of a gain. For in setting aside our own liberty, all that we have and hold, we become freer than we could ever be following our own paths, and choosing our own wills. In losing everything, we gain everything, for everything falls into place.
Having offered everything back to the Father, the Suscipe ends by begging: “Give me thy love and thy grace, for this is enough for me.” But, rather more appropriately, according to the Jesuit David Coffey, it can also be translated thus: “Grant me only to love you, give me this grace. This, truly, is enough for me.”
The grace to love God with God’s love – this brings out the depth of Ignatius’ prayer, and gives us a glimpse of the fruitfulness of his seemingly impossible quest. It is not that by self-offering, we beg for more love from God, because he has already given all and continues to give all. Rather, what we daringly and humbly beg for is the grace to love like he does, unsparingly, totally, radically, and so enter more deeply into his love and life. Once more, Robert Marsh sums it up: “The Contemplatio does not only dispose us to ‘attain love’—it seeks a gift of union, communion; it invites us to live as God lives and love as God loves by loving life and living life as gift, and giving life as gift; it invites us to make all our living and loving a work of art.”
All this is possible only because he has pronounced these words first: Take, receive! In giving all of himself, he has allowed us to love him in turn.