Discernment of Spirits
Today I've been attending "day one" of a weekend retreat on "Discernment of Spirits", directed by Fr. Timothy Gallagher, OMV, and sponsored by the Sisters of Life at their centre at St. Catherine of Siena Church on the Danforth in Toronto. Fr. Gallagher is growing in renown as popular retreat leader, lecturer, and scholar of St. Ignatius of Loyola. He has written best-selling books in recent years on discernment of spirits, the examen prayer, discerning God's will, Ignatian meditation, and a few other themes. He is a gifted communicator, and the message clearly flows from his own interior life. The "rules" for the discernment of spirits, of course, come from the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius. They were the fruit of Ignatius's own experience and observation of interior motions, which he refined and bequeathed to the Church. They are as valid a means of spiritual growth today as they were when he wrote them in the 16th century. In br...