Principle and Foundation
2^nd Part

Review last meditation: 

Remember at the end of your meditations to take 10 minutes to examine how things went.  Did I gain any fruit?  Did I keep a patient and peaceful disposition or was I worried? Did you persevere through for the entire hour of meditation?

Points for Consideration:

Fides et Ratio, John Paul II:

“Within visible creation, man is the only creature who not only is capable of knowing but who knows that he knows…People cannot be genuinely indifferent to the question of truth. If they discover something to be false, they reject it; but if they can establish its truth, they feel themselves rewarded.” (Fides et Ratio, 23)

The human mind asks the question of life’s meaning, which is one of the noblest of human tasks.  The love of wisdom, to ask for questions about the reason for things and their purpose… it is part of human nature itself…(Fides et Ratio, 3)

Saint Ignatius wants us to recognize the difference between God, man, and the other creatures — this can even be done without the assistance of Divine Revelation/Faith.  Revelation is a gratuitous gift that aids man in reaching truth.  But man is also able to discover many things, even without the additional help of Revealed Truths.  

The author GK Chesterton noted that prayer is quite natural for man.  In one of his books, Chesterton noted that the pagans, even though they worshiped false gods, show modern man that man is made to worship his Creator. 

“[Even though they were pagans, worshiping false gods, they] found it natural to worship…[the idols might have been very strange]; but the gesture of the worshipper was generous and beautiful.  [Man] not only felt freer when he bent; he actually felt taller when he bowed…anything that took away the gesture of worship would stunt and even maim him forever…being merely secular would be a [slavery and impediment].  If man cannot pray, he is gagged; if he cannot kneel he is in irons…when man makes the gesture of salutation and of sacrifice, when he [sacrifices], he knows he is doing a worthy and virile thing.  He knows he is doing the thing for which a man was made. (The Everlasting Man, Ch5, p111)

And Saint Paul, even though this is a reference from Scripture, shows that the Gentiles were guilty in the eyes of God — not for disobeying the law, for they did not have the law, but for disobeying their human nature.

Rom 1:18-23, For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and wickedness of men who by their wickedness suppress the truth. For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. Ever since the creation of the world his invisible nature, namely, his eternal power and deity, has been clearly perceived in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse; although they knew God they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking and their senseless minds were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man or birds or animals or reptiles.

They came to know God, by the attentive consideration of creatures. They are not guilty because they ignored the Sacred Scriptures, but because they didn’t follow the consequences of the knowledge of God acquired through their natural reason.

Ignorance is the lack of knowledge which a person is obliged and capable of possessing.  A more specific type of ignorance is affected ignorance, which is that ignorance which is desired in itself.  Sometimes it is rather convenient to be ignorant of knowledge.  Because it is intentionally sought, it makes the person even more culpable — it increases their guilt.  This is the attitude of the person who avoids obtaining information in order to act in accord with their desires.

In order to know who God is, we can know some things from natural reason and we can know much more about Him with the assistance of Revelation.  What are some of the reasons the a person might not assert God’s existence?  And what are the consequences of not acknowledging God?

Materialism – man’s horizon being fixed on sensible creatures which prevents him from transcending to spiritual things. 

Illuminism – which claims that for something to be true it must fit within the parameters of the material sciences. 

The ideology of immanentism: which reduces all reality to human thought. 

*These are all contributing factors that incline people to deny or ignore God’s existence.

Characteristics of God:

God’s simplicity:  He has no parts or composition.  He is.  Ipsum Esse Subsistens. 

God’s goodness:  All perfections exist in God.  He is the greatest good; As the first cause of all things, all perfections we recognize in creatures pre-exist in Him

God’s infinity:  His being has no limit, unlike creatures.  His essence is not limited in any way; unlike man — the person can do only certain things according to the essence of man.  Some men do things more perfectly, but man has limits.  This is not the case for the Divine Being.

God’s immutability:  Always the same and never changing

The consequences of being ignorant of God’s being are immense: 

• Spiritually, man will be poor: as a spiritual being, man is naturally oriented towards his creator.  To deny this will cause conflicts, frustrations, false ways to compensate
• Physically: man is body and soul which means physical health is also affected
• Morally: To deny God (something which is natural to him) will sting the conscience. It is not really possible to be ignorant of God, but to the extent that a person lives as though He were not or to the extent that someone attempts to impose ideas contrary to his reality, there is remorse of conscience.  Man finds himself and happiness by ordering Himself to God; to the extent that man denies God, he will find confusion and sadness

When Ignatius begins the Spiritual Exercises with the Principle and Foundation, we understand that he is not forcing us into a confined space, demanding or forcing us to adopt opinions.  With the Principle and Foundation, we have the chance to look at reality in an objective and straight-forward manner. 

To support this point, it may be helpful to hear the words of talk given by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, later Pope Benedict XVI. He highlights the point being made here: that Revelation, that is God’s revealed truth, is an aid to mankind.  In his speech, Cardinal Ratzinger is talking about the problem he encountered while teaching at a university

… a senior colleague [of mine]…expressed the opinion that one should actually be grateful to God that He allows there to be so many unbelievers in good conscience. For if their eyes were opened…they would not be capable, in this world of ours, of bearing the burden of faith with all its moral obligations. But as it is, since they can go another way in good conscience, they can reach salvation.

What shocked me about this assertion was not in the first place the idea of an erroneous conscience given by God Himself in order to save men by means of such artfulness—the idea, so to speak, of a blindness sent by God for the salvation of those in question. What disturbed me [most] was the notion that it [promoted], that faith is a burden …—faith almost as a kind of punishment… According to this view, faith would not make salvation easier but harder. Being happy would mean not being burdened with having to believe or having to submit to the moral yoke of [faith]. [According to this colleague of mine, the erroneous conscience, would make life easier and help man to lead a more human way of life; it would be a positive thing for man, and..untruth, to keep truth at a distance, would be better for man than to possess truth].

(CONSCIENCE AND TRUTH, Dallas, 1991)

His words in this speech make an important observation about man’s need to be rooted in reality.  Depending on how a person perceives another (even how he perceives God), he will treat the other.  Actions are determined by the ideas present in the mind.  If God is thought to not exist, one will not praise, reverence, and serve Him…which means such a person will be impoverished, because he will not be seeking or moving towards that which is most fundamental to human existence, salvation (or we can say happiness). 

Man praises God with the intellect.  By acknowledging the difference between God and creatures.  Man reverences God when the body acts according to the proper ideas of God.   The body testifies to the reality that creatures are ordered to something greater than themselves. As Chesterton wrote: man felt freer when he knelt; he actually felt taller when he bowed…taking away the gesture of worship would stunt and even maim man. To serve God means to willingly put ourselves underneath God’s omnipotence — not for a reward, but because it is proper; not because he will suffer if he goes against nature, but because it is strange to think something anti-natural in the first place. 

In this next meditation, remember that the main goal is to obtain the fruit, which is here to know the purpose for which I have been made.  It is not much knowledge that satisfies the soul, but the intimate understanding and relish of the truth.

At the end of the meditation, collect any of the insights you may have gained, making sure to give thanks to God for these graces. 

You can end with an Our Father.