Savio Rodrigues SJ

Ignatian contemplation makes use of guided imagery and active imagination within a selected gospel text.

It is advisable to choose an action filled passage, so that it brings one’s personal desires, inclinations, emotions, problems, shadows, etc. into focus in prayer, without planning to air these.

Choose an action filled passage from the gospel — one that has a lot of colour and movement. Avoid discourses, teachings and parables, for these will lead you to moralise or intellectualise.

Read the passage. Stop for about five seconds for the scene to settle in your mind. Read it once again so as to take in some of the details you may have overlooked. Stop and let it sink in. Read it once or twice more in case you feel you need to do so. Do not struggle to remember details or words or passages. Be fully satisfied with whatever you remember. Remembering the passage or its details is of no importance at all.

Place yourself in the presence of God. Centre yourself using any of the centering methods you feel suits you best. Centering is a help to create an empty mind, a mind free of worries and distractions. Have no fixed agenda or definite graces, but ask with an open mind and heart.

Now close the Bible and let yourself sink into the scene you have created for yourself through the reading of the passage. Let your self get lost in the scene and identify yourself with some person or something in the scene. Try and re-live the actual situation. You may soon find your self in active conversation, of helping or sharing or just being with someone in the scene. Be passive, but alert. Let the others in the scene control the events, you just go along, but always being a part of that reality that is re-enfolding.

Do not try to find parallels in the scriptures, or in your personal life. Avoid moralising like saying, “It should be like this”, “I must”, “We must”, “We could”, “It is better”, etc. No judgements or comparisons are to be made. When you get to your reflection later on, you will find yourself automatically living what you experienced in your contemplation.

You live in a world of emotions and feelings during the time of contemplation. Avoid any contact with the intellect.

After you have emerged from your contemplation you spend some time in reviewing your prayer. At this time you check as to what actually happened during that hour. What did you notice in your mind, feelings, sentiments, emotions etc. Write these down and try and discover what they are saying to you.

The Prayer Method on this page has been provided with permission from the book Pray: How? by Savio Rodrigues SJ