Windley-Daoust, Jerry. Imagine You Walked with Jesus: A Guide to Ignatian Contemplative Prayer. Our Sunday Visitor, 2021.
Do you read more spiritual books during Lent?
I guess I do (looking at the books I have been adding reviews for). This one, however, is going to be a favorite outside of Lent. I bought a copy of this for my daughter and her friend because they had returned from a FOCUS retreat with questions about contemplative prayer. Honestly, I have been looking for a guide like this for a long time. It appears that THIS is the time that God wants me to really take my prayer life to the next level since it is relatively new.
At the Catholic Writer’s Guild conference, one of the presenters suggested this book and I didn’t think much about it until Annie came home from her retreat with questions about contemplative prayer. I suggested The Interior Castle by St. Teresa of Avila, but I wasn’t sure it was the best book for a busy college junior who isn’t a fan of reading anyway. Then, I remembered the recommendation for Imagine You Walked With Jesus.
Have you tried contemplative prayer and been frustrated?
That is the story of my life! I don’t even have ADD or ADHD, but contemplative prayer has always been out of my reach. Sure, I’ve had a few memorable moments when I believe that I was deep in contemplative prayer, but I could never figure out how to duplicate it. The Interior Castle is supposed to be the best guide to contemplative prayer but after reading it, I just figured that maybe I wasn’t cut out for a deep prayer life.
We know that isn’t true! God is calling each of us to a deeper communion with Him and the way to that deeper relationship is through prayer. Contemplative prayer.
How is contemplative prayer different from other kinds of prayer?
The Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC) highlights three types of prayer.
First is vocal prayer when one is praying out loud (or silently) either using a formula (Our Father, Hail Mary, or Glory Be for instance) or speaking extemporaneously to God through Jesus.
If we think of prayer as an attempt to build a relationship with Jesus, then vocal prayer is like calling Him and blathering on without giving Him time to respond. It might make me feel better to vent, but I won’t benefit from His input and worse, I won’t build a relationship with Him.
But seriously, I have been blathering on to God for a long, long time. I’m sure He doesn’t mind listening to me, but I am ready for His input. It is necessary for me to grow in faith, hope, and love.
Second is meditative prayer which is “active mental prayer” where the person uses scripture, the liturgy, icons, or God’s creation and then engages the life of Christ with the mind, imagination and emotion. Lectio divina and the Holy Rosary are ways to engage in meditative prayer.
Be sure you don’t confuse the concept of Christian meditative prayer with eastern meditation. In eastern meditation, the goal is to empty one’s mind while in Christian meditative prayer the goal is to fill ones mind with Scripture.
I have been spending time every day in meditative prayer using the Holy Rosary and Scriptures in lectio divina. I have filled my house (much to my husband’s chagrin) with sacred art as well. Is that mindfulness? No. I have friends who suggest mindfulness as a way to live a calmer more centered life. I have tried mindfulness meditation, but I find it pales in comparison to meditative prayer. Since I have a regular and fulfilling meditative prayer practice, I don’t need to add mindfulness meditation.
Is that mindfulness? No. I have friends who suggest mindfulness as a way to live a calmer more centered life. I have tried mindfulness meditation, but I find it pales in comparison to meditative prayer.
To me, meditative prayer is a “calling to mind” the life of Jesus. It is possible to “hear” the Lord speaking to me when I meditate on the scriptures. Still, I crave more. I would like to regularly experience a deeper prayer life that comes through “a resignation to the will to God” (Avila).
Third is contemplative prayer when one moves from “actively engaging our thoughts, imagination, emotion and desire… to union with Christ himself and the experience of his love in contemplation” (St. Paul Center). It involves being quiet in the presence of God and allowing Him to pour Himself into our hearts.
THIS is what I’m after. I think it is time for me to be still and know God. I am excited that my youngest daughter is interested in contemplative prayer (she is only 20), I hope that her prayer life takes off as a result of it. Here I am at 61 and finally making a serious attempt at it.
Better late than never!
Thank you, Annie for leading me in this direction. I’m not surprised to learn from her, scriptures say, “and a child shall lead them” (Isaiah 11:6). Honestly, that is why I had six kids, I knew I needed them to lead me to a deeper relationship with Christ. As a young mother with 3 children, I started studying the Bible seriously and Timothy 2:15 claims, “Yet she shall be saved through childbearing; if she continue in faith, and love, and sanctification, with sobriety.” That verse really spoke to me. I knew I needed to have more children to counteract my selfish nature.
Andy and I had our first child in 1988 and our last in 2001. In May, we will be officially done raising our children when our youngest turns 21. Our oldest will turn 33 later in the summer. Thirty-three years of parenting. I highly recommend it!
St. Ignatius’ type contemplative prayer is different from St. Teresa’s contemplative prayer
I think St. Ignatius’ type is somewhere beyond meditative prayer, but not quite contemplative prayer as St. Teresa explains it in the 4th mansion of the interior castle. But…baby steps.
These baby steps are what I have been seeking. I found the leap from meditative prayer to contemplative prayer too big. I couldn’t wrap my head around it. I couldn’t imagine getting from meditation to contemplation.
Imagination is the baby step. St. Ignatius was a big fan of imagination. His imagination led him to be a priest and to start the Society of Jesus (the Jesuits). The book Imagine You Walked With Jesus is based on the Jesuit Spiritual Exercises but broken down so that regular people (like me, Annie, and her friend) can utilize it in our busy, everyday lives.
Though a little older than her, St. Ignatius (b. 1491, d. 1556) and St. Teresa of Avila (b. 1515, d. 1582) were contemporaries. It makes me wonder what was going on in the world at that time for these two great saints to live at the same time.
What is the book like?
The first chapter explains imaginative prayer and the background of St. Ignatius describing how he came to create his famous Spiritual Exercises.
The next chapter is so cool. It is “A Brief Tour of First-Century Palestine” which was very helpful for me. I have no imaginative powers. None. In fact, when I “see” Jesus or the saints in my mind, I see either a statue or a painting. Isn’t that weird? I was about 50 years old when I realized that other people can actually remember people’s faces and imagine things. Windley-Daoust gives details about what people wore, how they lived, and how ancient Palestine was different from the modern world. Those of you with imaginations will like it too, you can imagine more accurately with this chapter.
The next 40 chapters are individual meditations starting with Mary’s visit to Elizabeth (Lk 1:39 – 49) and ending with Jesus forgiving Peter (Jn 21:1 – 19).
After that 40th chapter is a chapter devoted to helping the reader continue the process. It suggests ways to use the book again, using a journal, finding more stories to use and more. It’s basically ideas to deepen your prayer life after you have finished the book.
The next chapter is “Five Examples of Imaginative Prayer.” I read that one after reading the first two chapters. As a person with no imagination, I needed to read how other people do it in order to fully engage in the first meditation.
Next is “How to Organize and Run a ‘Walking with Jesus’ Prayer Group.” Of course, I’m serious considering this. At our parish we have a few people who regularly lead us in book studies and I love that, but a prayer group would be such a blessing.
Finally there is a “Reading Plans” chapter where the author has gone to great lengths to organize the different chapters into thematic units. He has them organized by books of the Bible, by liturgical season, by the mysteries of the rosary and even a list of the simpler stories. Wow. This book was clearly a labor of love. If you can’t find something to love about it, I would be surprised.
What is a meditation chapter like?
Each is about 8 pages long. They are broken into: Prepare, Read, Set the Scene, Consider, Walk with Jesus, and Reflect on the Journey.
The “Prepare” section is a short prayer and the “Read” section includes the scripture written in paragraph form without the line numbers. I really like that because it reads more like a story that way instead of like lines to memorize or consider out of context.
“Set the Scene” is next which is about four paragraphs of background information. As an English teacher, I find this both impressive and helpful. This is what English teachers share with their students before reading something new to help students activate their prior knowledge and understand anything out of the ordinary that is important to understanding the reading.
“Consider” consists of questions to help aid the imagination such as, “what do you see, hear, smell, and feel?”
“Walk with Jesus” is short but powerful. This is where the contemplation would begin. After imagining the biblical scene and understanding what Jesus is saying to you as you read, here you “take a moment to pray for what your heart most desires from this encounter with Jesus.” The important word here is “heart” not mind, but heart. What does your heart need and want from Jesus?
Finally, we are to “Reflect on the Journey.” The suggestion is to think about the experience and journal about it or share it with your prayer group. I’m thinking, “Why not do both?” The questions at the end of each section are very contextual and powerful. For instance in the 2nd chapter (The Holy Family Flees to Egypt) one of the questions is: “Joseph is sometimes called ‘the dreamer’ because God spoke to him through four dreams. How does God speak to you?”
Personally, I like the idea of using each chapter for an entire week. There is just too much depth in each one to rush through the exercise and try to finish it all up in an hour. I would love to start on Monday and finish on Sunday with a prayer group meeting to discuss everyone’s experiences.
Hardback, Paperback, or Kindle
I love my Kindle. I know, many people hate screens and love to hold a book in their hand. Me too. I also just love the idea of having 100s of books in my back pocket! They are great for travel.
I bought my daughter and her friend paperback copies and myself the Kindle edition. I don’t regret having it on my Kindle. I like having prayer books, Bibles, and spiritual reading on my Kindle so I don’t have to pack them for vacation. Before I got a Kindle, I spent more time selecting which books to travel with than I did deciding on which shoes to pack. Now, I’m all about the shoes!
I am going to buy myself a paperback copy though. I want to keep it in my Bible tote bag that I bring to my weekly Adoration hour. I want to take notes in it and write down when I did each meditation.
How is your prayer life? Which books on prayer have influenced you? Are you ready for contemplation?