Array
(
    [fullTitle] => Personal Discernment and Dialogue. Learning from ‘the Other’
    [abstract] => This article considers the theme of discernment in the tradition of Ignatian spirituality emanating from the Spiritual Exercises of St Ignatius of Loyola (1491-1556), the founder of the Society of Jesus (Jesuits). After a brief introduction which addresses the central problematic of bad influences that manifest themselves as good, the article turns to the life and work of two Jesuits, the 16th C English missionary to India, Thomas Stephens and the 20th C French historian and cultural critic, Michel de Certeau. Both kept up a constant dialogue with local culture in which they sought authenticity in their response to ‘events’, whether a hideous massacre which shaped the pastoral commitment and writing of Stephens in the south of the Portuguese enclave of Goa or the 1968 student-led protests in Paris that so much affected the thinking of de Certeau. Very different in terms of personal background and contemporary experience, they both share in a tradition of discernment as a virtuous response to what both would understand as the ‘wisdom of the Spirit’ revealed in their personal interactions with ‘the other’.
    [authors] => Array
        (
            [0] => Array
                (
                    [givenName] => Michael
                    [affiliation] => University of Roehampton
                )

        )

    [keywords] => Array
        (
            [0] => discernment
            [1] => dialogue
            [2] => pedagogy
            [3] => culture
            [4] => other
            [5] => virtue
        )

    [doi] => 10.24204/ejpr.v12i4.3615
    [datePublished] => 2020-12-30
    [pdf] => https://www.philosophy-of-religion.eu/menuscript/index.php/ejpr/article/view/3669/version/1054/2780
)
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Personal Discernment and Dialogue. Learning from ‘the Other’

Michael
University of Roehampton

DOI: https://doi.org/10.24204/ejpr.v12i4.3615

Abstract

This article considers the theme of discernment in the tradition of Ignatian spirituality emanating from the Spiritual Exercises of St Ignatius of Loyola (1491-1556), the founder of the Society of Jesus (Jesuits). After a brief introduction which addresses the central problematic of bad influences that manifest themselves as good, the article turns to the life and work of two Jesuits, the 16th C English missionary to India, Thomas Stephens and the 20th C French historian and cultural critic, Michel de Certeau. Both kept up a constant dialogue with local culture in which they sought authenticity in their response to ‘events’, whether a hideous massacre which shaped the pastoral commitment and writing of Stephens in the south of the Portuguese enclave of Goa or the 1968 student-led protests in Paris that so much affected the thinking of de Certeau. Very different in terms of personal background and contemporary experience, they both share in a tradition of discernment as a virtuous response to what both would understand as the ‘wisdom of the Spirit’ revealed in their personal interactions with ‘the other’.

Keywords: discernment

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