Campus Ministry

At Manresa, Ignatius grew immensely emotionally and spiritually. However, he went through many struggles to get there. In his desire to be greater than other saints, he went to extremes. He lived in a cave and engaged in many spiritual disciplines. Since he was so vain about his appearance before his conversion, he stopped grooming and engaged in excessive fasting. Eventually this made him sick. Fortunately, some women of the area convinced him that fewer people would listen to him if he did not take care of his appearance. Similarly, he faced some mental health problems with an eating disorder and obsessive fixation on his sins which led to bouts of depression. Fortunately, a priest realized that he was struggling with scruples and forbad him to go to confession again until he committed a more serious sin. Shortly after, at the River Cardoner, Ignatius had one of the most powerful visions of his life where he deeply felt God's love and forgiveness and saw how God was working in the world. Ignatius wanted people to experience a similar transformation without going through the excesses he had, so he wrote his retreat manual, The Spiritual Exercises.

In Jerusalem, Ignatius was overwhelmed at the chance to visit the places where Jesus had actually lived. It was a time of great consolation, but he was obsessed with forcing his beliefs on others. At the time, Jerusalem was controlled by the Ottoman Empire. As Muslims they were open to everyone praying in Jerusalem as long as they respected the Islamic belief that there should be no coercion in religious beliefs. Christians had regularly disrespected this expectation, especially during various crusades. However, St. Francis of Assisi and Sultan Al Malik Al Kamil came to an agreement that the Franciscans would ensure that Christians would conduct themselves respectfully when they visited the Holy Land. Ignatius at this time was not secure in his faith enough to balance his personal beliefs with respecting religious differences. However, he did have a desire to "sentir con la Iglesia."- "feel/think with the church". So when the Franciscan abbot told him that he needed to leave and get an education before returning, he submitted after threat of excommunication. While Ignatius did not embody cultural humility, other Jesuits such as Matteo Ricci, S.J., and Phillip deNobli, S.J., would later model this for the Church. Ignatius for his part was humble enough to take direction from Church leaders who had greater experience and authority.

Ignatuis began his studies in Barcelona where he had to do remedial work in order to learn Latin which was essential for advanced degrees in his time. This meant, as a man in his latter 20s, he was taking classes with young boys because they did not have classes for adults. Still, Ignatius stayed focused on his goals, and would continue to do so in several cities in Spain as he progressed through his studies. In his spare time, he engaged in preaching and invited people to make the Spiritual Exercises. The Spanish Inquisition regularly questioned and even arrested him. Ignatius stayed true to his conscience and defended his beliefs and would regularly ask them to show him what he was doing that contradicted the Church. Since they could never find anything wrong, he was let go with the instructions not to preach until he had his degree. 

Paris was a time of a lot of integration for Ignatius. He finally balanced his time between his studies, service, preaching and prayer. He realized that sometimes "good" things could be a temptation. So he put limitations on the amount of time that he was preaching, doing service, and even praying because he believed God wanted him to study at this time in his life. Still, Ignatius developed some deep friendships with people, some of whom became the first Jesuits.