From Desolation to Consolation - What is Desolation?

From Desolation to Consolation - What is Desolation?

“I could spend the rest of my life teaching people about discernment!” I make this proclamation with excitement often to my husband, Chris, and to one of my best friends and fellow Into the Deep writers, Stephanie Cloautre Davis on a regular basis. They both know me well enough to know that I am not making some off-handed comment, but a statement of belief. They also both know and live St. Ignatius’ discernment wisdom and know firsthand the power of learning how to discern the spirits in their own lives.

This next series on the Into the Deep blog is titled What is Desolation? A year or so ago, all the writers wrote a series called Consolation Beyond a Smile to help us dive into the movement of the Holy Spirit in our lives and how we can receive the movement of the Holy Spirit in our lives. Consolation and our actions to embrace this gift are necessary components of discernment. The other side of the coin is looking at desolation and how we reject the movements of the false spirit so that we can move back towards God.

Where is it leading me?

Fr. Timothy Gallagher’s acronym B.U.T. is a helpful tool to help us understand the discernment of spirits.

B-e Aware

U-nderstand

T-ake Action (receive/reject)

He reminds us that the first step of discerning the spirits is acknowledging there are movements of the spirits within us. We also must acknowledge our humaneness as well. He reminds us to “Be Aware” of what is happening in us. Once we pay attention to the movement happening within, we ask the question of “Where is this leading me?” As we are made aware of what is happening and what direction we are going in, towards God or away from God, then we act. We receive what is a movement of the Holy Spirit. We reject what is not from God. We take bold action.

What is desolation?

In #317 of the Spiritual Exercises, St. Ignatius defines desolation:

“I call it spiritual desolation what is entirely the opposite of what is described in spiritual consolation…darkness of soul, turmoil of spirit, restlessness, slothfulness, tepid, sad, separated…. decrease of faith, of hope, and of love.”

Desolation is anything that moves us or leads us away from God.

A wise friend and spiritual director colleague, Sr. Molly Neville, shared on a recent Going Past the Shallows course to look for the D’s of Desolation to help us tune into the movement of the false spirit. A full list of the D’s of desolation can be found here at this downloadable PDF, but to highlight a few:

· Disheartened

· Doubt

· Despondent

· Disquiet

· Deflated

· Driven

· Discombobulated

As we become aware of the movement of desolation within us, we can acknowledge it, reject the false spirit, and ask for God’s help to bring us back to consolation, where we will once again find ourselves being lead towards God.

Help of a Spiritual Director

Knowing the movement of both consolation and desolation in our lives helps us tune into the voice of God and discern which way God is inviting us to go. A spiritual director can help us with discerning the movements of the spirits and paying attention to the particular markers of consolation and desolation in our lives. As we learn this, we come to understand how intimately God speaks to us in our lives and works to bring us out of desolation into consolation.

In the weeks ahead, our writers will share different ways desolation shows up in them and how they work with God to move from desolation into consolation. I pray this series helps you tune into to the movement of spirits in your own life and that you find the wisdom shared as powerful of a tool as Chris, Stephanie, and I do!

Going Deeper:

• Our Into the Deep Blog Series; Consolation Beyond a Smile
• Read Listening When Stuck by Becky Eldredge for the dotMagis blog series on IgnatianSpirituality.com
• Consider registering for our new course by Becky Eldredge, Going Past the Shallows 3 - The First Set of Rules of Discernment. Click on the link to learn more.

Photo by Kinga Howard on Unsplash

Thank you!

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Becky Eldredge

Becky is an Ignatian-trained spiritual director passionate about inviting people closer to Christ. She does this by accompanying people as they navigate deep waters of their faith lives through spiritual direction, teaching, writing, retreats, and as founder of Ignatian Ministries. She is author of two books: The Inner Chapel (Loyola Press, April 2020) and Busy Lives and Restless Souls (Loyola Press, March 2017). She has also contributed reflections for Give us This Day (Liturgical Press) and the Homilists for the Homeless series from Clear Faith Publishing. Becky is part of the Archdiocese of New Orleans Spirituality Center teaching staff where she trains spiritual directors in the Ignatian tradition. She lives in Baton Rouge, Louisiana with her husband and three children.