Heart of the Spiritual Exercises Archives

HSE1 – Introduction – The Heart of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola with Fr. Anthony Wieck S.J. – Discerning Hearts Catholic Podcasts

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Introduction – The Heart of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola with Fr. Anthony Wieck S.J.

In this first episode, Fr. Anthony Wick joins Kris McGregor to explore the personal journey that led him to discover and embrace the spirituality of St. Ignatius of Loyola. Drawing from his upbringing on a Montana farm, the influence of his Jesuit-formed father, and his own experiences with retreats and education at the St. Ignatius Institute, Fr. Wick recounts how Ignatian spirituality gradually drew him toward religious life. Despite early resistance and a desire for marriage and family, he found himself captivated by Ignatius’ approach to prayer, discernment, and inner freedom. A pivotal moment came when a Jesuit friend suggested he spend time at the Casa Alverà in Rome, a house of discernment that helped clarify his vocation.

The conversation highlights how St. Ignatius’ own life was transformed through suffering, especially during his convalescence after being wounded in battle. Reading the lives of Christ and the saints, Ignatius began to notice the different effects that thoughts had on his spirit. Some left him empty while others filled him with joy. This observation became the basis for his discernment of spirits, a foundational principle in the Spiritual Exercises. Fr. Wick explains how Ignatius’ mystical experiences in the cave at Manresa laid the groundwork for this practical and deeply personal spiritual tool. He also shares how discovering his own patron saint, St. Anthony of Egypt, helped confirm his call and opened his heart to the flourishing that comes with finding one’s true spiritual father. The episode invites listeners to explore which saints may have chosen them and to pursue those interior stirrings that lead toward deeper relationship with Christ.

Discerning Hearts Catholic Reflection Questions:

When you reflect on your own spiritual journey, can you identify moments when God reoriented your plans toward something deeper?
What inner responses do you experience when considering the lives of the saints—do any leave you especially consoled or stirred?
Have you ever noticed different spiritual “fruits” from your thoughts or desires, as St. Ignatius did during his convalescence?
What does it mean to you that the saints might choose us, rather than the other way around?
How has your understanding of spiritual fatherhood or motherhood shaped your prayer life and discernment?
In what ways might God be inviting you to surrender inordinate attachments or self-centered plans?
Which particular saints have helped you flourish in your spiritual life, and how have they guided your path?
How can you begin or deepen a habit of prayerfully listening to God through the charism of a particular spiritual tradition?

Fr. Anthony Wieck is a Jesuit priest of the Central & Southern province. Sixth of nine children, raised on a farm in Oregon, Fr. Anthony began religious life in 1994, spending his first five years of formation in Rome, Italy, studying at the Casa Balthasar and the Gregorian. The former was under the watchful patronage of Pope Benedict XVI (then-Card. Joseph Ratzinger). Fr. Anthony currently acts as retreat master at White House Jesuit Retreat in St. Louis, Missouri. He also offers spiritual direction at the St. Louis diocesan seminary for 25 future priests there.

HSE13 – Contemplation to Attain the Love of God, pt. 2 – The Heart of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola with Fr. Anthony Wieck S.J. – Discerning Hearts Catholic Podcasts

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Contemplation to Attain the Love of God, pt. 2 – The Heart of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola with Fr. Anthony Wieck S.J.

Fr. Anthony Wieck and Kris McGregor continue this series centered around the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola. In part two of our conversation, Fr. Wieck discusses contemplation to attain the love of God.

An excerpt from the conversation:

“I feel like in my own prayer too, I don’t know how to do this well, I don’t claim to have mastered this, but one thing I do know how to do is to ask God for the grace. Help me to let go, help me to open up the pores of my being to be saturated in your love, Lord. I know that I get off track, I know I don’t see well, I know I tend to… But I ask that you clear my soul. I ask that you purify my heart. I ask that you open up every pore of my soul to receive more of you, to bask in that, help me to hold the gaze of you, Heavenly Father. Help me to bask in that. I don’t know how to pray as I ought. And yet, I know that you want to open up these crevices, these shafts within me.

And so, I’m asking you to do exactly that. And as the Lord gives us that grace, we’ll be so grateful to the Lord. We won’t pump our chest about being spiritual and be like, wow, Lord, you’re amazing. I asked this prayer and you’re responding to it. You’re allowing me to surfeit myself in your blessings, to be just surfeited in them, to be overwhelmed in them, to be inundated with your blessings. I don’t think we know how to do that as we ought, and I find that consoling though, that that too becomes a gift from God to allow us to enter into this experience. That was just the first point I’ve only touched on in the contemplation to obtain divine love. That’s worth its own prayer, obviously, but that’s the riches and the depths of this prayer.”

Fr. Anthony Wieck is a Jesuit priest of the Central & Southern province. Sixth of nine children, raised on a farm in Oregon, Fr. Anthony began religious life in 1994, spending his first five years of formation in Rome, Italy, studying at the Casa Balthasar and the Gregorian. The former was under the watchful patronage of Pope Benedict XVI (then-Card. Joseph Ratzinger). Fr. Anthony currently acts as retreat master at the White House Jesuit Retreat in St. Louis, Missouri. He also offers spiritual direction at the St. Louis diocesan seminary for 25 future priests there.

HSE12 – Contemplation to Attain the Love of God, pt. 1 – The Heart of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola with Fr. Anthony Wieck S.J. – Discerning Hearts Catholic Podcasts

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Contemplation to Attain the Love of God, pt. 1 – The Heart of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola with Fr. Anthony Wieck S.J.

Fr. Anthony Wieck and Kris McGregor continue this series centered around the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola. In part one of our conversation, Fr. Wieck discusses contemplation to attain the love of God.

An excerpt from the conversation:

“So the mission comes, I first need to enter into a relationship which is initiated by God. And from that, I discover my identity and then I am sent out. So it’s being drawn, allowing myself to be drawn in to the heart of Christ. And there there’s a purification that goes on for me. There’s a restoration in me. There’s a receiving the gracious of God, knowing myself as his beloved child, and now leaning into the mission and spreading that joy, spreading that new life, the life of Christ that overwhelms me, that amazes me, that strikes me.

St. Paul did exactly that, he allowed himself to be drawn into the loving heart of Christ, filled with that love of God, he began to spread it. But it wasn’t that project for him, you know, a project to spread the gospel, a project that he kind of calculated how things would be. And so he was a very efficient apostle. No, he was an efficacious apostle because he knew first and foremost, he was called to be conformed to Christ. So he does speak about all the sufferings and the beatings and the imprisonments and the shipwrecks and things that he underwent for God’s sake, the experiencing that the life of Christ and the death of self, more and more life of Christ as he died to himself. So that’s meant to be our experience too, but it’s being drawn into the experience of Jesus. Our faith is intimately relational, and hence we discover identity and then our mission forth to draw others into that same experience of relationality. And profound being drawn in, cleansed, strengthened, made whole.

That’s why it’s so important that we can take a look at this great gift of the spiritual exercises of Saint Ignatius, because it really can help the average person can. Because if it’s truly this gift, this great grace from God, it’s meant to help build up the church as a whole, isn’t it?”

Fr. Anthony Wieck is a Jesuit priest of the Central & Southern province. Sixth of nine children, raised on a farm in Oregon, Fr. Anthony began religious life in 1994, spending his first five years of formation in Rome, Italy, studying at the Casa Balthasar and the Gregorian. The former was under the watchful patronage of Pope Benedict XVI (then-Card. Joseph Ratzinger). Fr. Anthony currently acts as retreat master at the White House Jesuit Retreat in St. Louis, Missouri. He also offers spiritual direction at the St. Louis diocesan seminary for 25 future priests there.

HSE11 – Rules of the Second Week – The Heart of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola with Fr. Anthony Wieck S.J. – Discerning Hearts Catholic Podcasts

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Consolation, Desolation, and Rules of the Second Week – The Heart of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola with Fr. Anthony Wieck S.J.

Fr. Anthony Wieck and Kris McGregor continue this series centered around the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola. Fr. Wieck discusses consolation, desolation, and how they impact the Second Week Rules for discernment.

An excerpt from the conversation:

“The first week had 14 rules, and this second week only has eight. So, he says that it’s proper to God and his angels in their movements to give true spiritual gladness and joy. So Satan can’t give us true spiritual gladness and joy. That makes sense. And so it’s only God who can take away all sadness and disturbance, which the enemy brings on.

The evil spirit is always going to fight against this spiritual gladness and true consolation, bringing apparent reasons, subtleties, continual fallacies using false reasonings to get me off track. We hear a resonance to the first rules of our first week. Second of the eight, it belongs to God, our Lord, to give consolation to the soul without preceding cause. This is a little bit trickier.

So if I am reading a book that I really like, it’s very inspiring, a great author, and I’m starting to feel really inflamed with the love of God in consolation. That’s because I’m, there’s a cause in involved, and that is I’m reading a book, or I have some good friends who are coming tonight. ‘They’re going to come visit me. I’m so excited. I haven’t seen them in years!‘ And so there’s a preceding cause. I’m feeling really grateful to the Lord, feeling warm. I am coming back from an amazing encounter or spiritual direction session. I’m feeling really buoyant, a consolation with a cause, which is a good thing.

But only God can give consolation without a preceding cause that, sometimes, God just gives me a consolation with no particular reason and He just … I’m just overwhelmed and filled. This happened to Saint Ignatius so many times in his life, he began to lose some of his eyesight from all of his tears of joy. So a consolation without cause can only come from God. The evil spirit can’t do that.

So whenever cause comes into … whenever a consolation with a cause, so from reading or from an encounter, from something that happened, the good spirit will use that to the opposite means of the evil spirit. So the good spirit will use that consolation of the soul to profit it, to help it grow and rise in the praise and service of God.”

Fr. Anthony Wieck is a Jesuit priest of the Central & Southern province. Sixth of nine children, raised on a farm in Oregon, Fr. Anthony began religious life in 1994, spending his first five years of formation in Rome, Italy, studying at the Casa Balthasar and the Gregorian. The former was under the watchful patronage of Pope Benedict XVI (then-Card. Joseph Ratzinger). Fr. Anthony currently acts as retreat master at the White House Jesuit Retreat in St. Louis, Missouri. He also offers spiritual direction at the St. Louis diocesan seminary for 25 future priests there.

HSE10 – Consolation and Desolation – The Heart of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola with Fr. Anthony Wieck S.J. – Discerning Hearts Catholic Podcasts

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Consolation and Desolation – The Heart of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola with Fr. Anthony Wieck S.J.

Fr. Anthony Wieck and Kris McGregor continue this series centered around the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola. Fr. Wieck discusses consolation, desolation, and the ways the Enemy can strike our weak points.

An excerpt from the conversation:

“So we have this ability, again, to overcome these evil spirits. And when that spirit’s nagging me to think badly about a person, to gossip about them, to whatever it is, I need to make a show of strength and say, “I’m not going there.” I need to have a holy violence, even Jesus says. “The violent bear it away,” says Flannery O’Connor. That only the violent will make it to heaven, meaning I stand up to that, their holy violence, like, “No, I’m not doing that. I’m not giving into that temptation,” that whatever, maybe a sexual temptation. Say, “I’m not going there. I’m not going to allow this to plague me. I’m not going to watch this anymore. I’m exiting out. I’m shutting off my computer. I’m shutting off this program. I’m not going to flip through channels and see how much I can justify. I stand up against that evil spirit.”

He says, if you don’t do that, if you don’t stand up against this evil spirit as he nags me into doing something, if I have fear or I lose heart, there’s no beast so wild on the face of the earth as the enemy of our human nature and following out his damnable intention with so great malice. So the enemy of the human nature, that’s so interesting, isn’t it? It speaks to the Catholic view of human nature that’s very positive. But the enemy of human nature has damnable intentions, totally wants us under his standard. He wants us in hell with him. He’s declared war, Revelations 12, “Against all the offspring of the woman,” whom you and I are. That’s the one way he can get back at God, is to destroy his handiwork and to get his handiwork to commit one unrepented mortal sin that will damn them for eternity. So we need to stand up to those temptations towards evil there in that when we’re nagged into doing such a thing like that.”

Fr. Anthony Wieck is a Jesuit priest of the Central & Southern province. Sixth of nine children, raised on a farm in Oregon, Fr. Anthony began religious life in 1994, spending his first five years of formation in Rome, Italy, studying at the Casa Balthasar and the Gregorian. The former was under the watchful patronage of Pope Benedict XVI (then-Card. Joseph Ratzinger). Fr. Anthony currently acts as retreat master at the White House Jesuit Retreat in St. Louis, Missouri. He also offers spiritual direction at the St. Louis diocesan seminary for 25 future priests there.

HSE9 – The Reasons for Spiritual Desolation – The Heart of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola with Fr. Anthony Wieck S.J. – Discerning Hearts Catholic Podcasts

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The Reasons for Spiritual Desolation – The Heart of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola with Fr. Anthony Wieck S.J.

Fr. Anthony Wieck and Kris McGregor continue this series centered around the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola. Fr. Wieck discusses reasons we often fall into desolation.

An excerpt from the conversation:

“A critical piece of the discernment of spirits is this toggling back and forth from one side to another, between consolation and desolation. Now, this is a really critical insight of Saint Ignatius. So helpful. Imagine there’s two angles at which we serve the Lord, either through consolation on one side and desolation from the other side, so consolation or desolation. In consolation, so he defines his terms very well, thankfully, he calls it an interior movement in which the soul is inflamed with love of its creator and Lord. And therefore, it can love everything on the face of the Earth and the Lord, kind of like the principle of foundation, all things are created to the praise, reverence, and service of God. I should use them insofar as they help me to praise, reverence, and serve God.

So in consolation, I feel inflamed with the love of God, I want to grow in the love of God. I’m so grateful to be alive. I can, he says, “even shed tears from love,” love of my Lord, perhaps even from sorrow from my sin, so that would be in consolation, spiritual consolation we’re speaking about. Spiritual consolation, I might be sorry for my sins, or the passion of Christ, what he’s done for me. I’m amazed by that. Everything leads towards the praise, reverence, and service of God, though. Note that direction, that direction, so in spiritual consolation, I feel buoyant. “I feel an increase,” he says, “in the theological virtues of faith, hope, and charity. I’m growing in the love of the Lord,” so wonderful experience. There’s an interior joy in me. I’m more and more attracted to heavenly things, and to the salvation of my soul. I’m feeling peace from our Lord. That’s a wonderful experience.”

Fr. Anthony Wieck is a Jesuit priest of the Central & Southern province. Sixth of nine children, raised on a farm in Oregon, Fr. Anthony began religious life in 1994, spending his first five years of formation in Rome, Italy, studying at the Casa Balthasar and the Gregorian. The former was under the watchful patronage of Pope Benedict XVI (then-Card. Joseph Ratzinger). Fr. Anthony currently acts as retreat master at the White House Jesuit Retreat in St. Louis, Missouri. He also offers spiritual direction at the St. Louis diocesan seminary for 25 future priests there.

HSE8 – The Two Standards: Christ or the Enemy – The Heart of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola with Fr. Anthony Wieck S.J. – Discerning Hearts Catholic Podcasts

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The Two Standards – The Heart of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola with Fr. Anthony Wieck S.J.

Fr. Anthony Wieck and Kris McGregor continue this series centered around the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola. This episode focuses on the standards of Christ versus the standards of the Enemy.

An excerpt from the conversation:

“So Satan always is trying to tempt Jesus to focus on himself, and Jesus instead is constantly focused on the Father. His center is always on the Father. He’s eccentric. From and center, his center is always away from Himself in the Father. He’s a man in love. This is the son of God made flesh. You and I will only find ourselves in being in love. So all right. So that’s the temptation of Satan. And so creature comforts, by the way, in religious life, there’s a lot of temptations for little ways of taking a trip or maybe pocketing some money or things like that. Poverty, St. Ignatius says is the bulwark of the religious life.

So it’s the protecting bulwark of the religious life. And that will be the first to be attacked by Satan. It’s the first to go, pocket money on the side. People may give me, entitled to do certain things with money sent my way. We’ve seen some good priests in religious recently, very popular ones that have first fallen, allowed poverty to kind of be broken down, and then one thing leads to another, and then unfortunately, we read about them in the papers. It’s so sad and scandalous.

But that’s the common way Satan works with us. So we do have to watch all kinds of things like my wardrobe. Do I keep allowing new things to be brought in there, or do each time I add something, I subtract something also? Am I living a certain simplicity of life? That’s the invitation, not to keep needing more and more things to live a higher and higher standard of living. That’s the danger.”

Fr. Anthony Wieck is a Jesuit priest of the Central & Southern province. Sixth of nine children, raised on a farm in Oregon, Fr. Anthony began religious life in 1994, spending his first five years of formation in Rome, Italy, studying at the Casa Balthasar and the Gregorian. The former was under the watchful patronage of Pope Benedict XVI (then-Card. Joseph Ratzinger). Fr. Anthony currently acts as retreat master at the White House Jesuit Retreat in St. Louis, Missouri. He also offers spiritual direction at the St. Louis diocesan seminary for 25 future priests there.

HSE7 – What Has God Elected to Us? – The Heart of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola with Fr. Anthony Wieck S.J. – Discerning Hearts Catholic Podcasts

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What Has God Elected to Us? – The Heart of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola with Fr. Anthony Wieck S.J.

Fr. Anthony Wieck and Kris McGregor continue this series centered around the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola. This episode focuses on Week Two of the Spiritual Exercises.

An excerpt from the conversation:

“And so, this is an invitation for you and me to detach from the common things that we cling to and we listen to this call of certain people, who are inspired to want to live exactly what Christ lived. That’s what the religious life is, really. You’re living the actual poverty. You’re living the same kind of life he lived. We need to be inspired by that. That should be something that we find very attractive. Most of us will not be called to the religious life, but we need to understand and appreciate what a gift it would be to be called.”

“He chooses us for whatever path, married life, religious life, whatever vowed life He’s calling us to. But it’s all according to His greater servicing praise. So we’re listening. It’s always a listening response. It’s not I’m finding in myself some natural generosity. It’s not ‘I propose and then God disposes’. I propose what I’d like to do with my life and see if God is going to sign off on that. No, it’s a received gift to imitate the Lord in my particular state and way of life. But we do this in front of, he says, in front of the presence of God with His glorious mother, all the saints of the heavenly court. Saint Ignatius loved to ponder himself before the heavenly court.

So, I think this call is objectively considered for Ignatius. It’s listened to, it’s made by the retreat end, but we’re not yet at a time of choice. The retreat end is not yet. This is the beginning of the second week. Towards the end, we’ll start making a personal choice, but we really need to consider what a gift it would be to be called to the same way and state of life bearing, even living of actual poverty without a bank account, those kind of things. But we do want to bear all injuries with Jesus too.”

HSE6 – Ignatian Prayer – The Heart of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola with Fr. Anthony Wieck S.J. – Discerning Hearts Catholic Podcasts

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Ignatian Prayer – The Heart of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola with Fr. Anthony Wieck S.J.

Fr. Anthony Wieck and Kris McGregor continue this series centered around the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola. This episode takes a look at the Spiritual Exercises through methods of Ignatian prayer.

An excerpt from the conversation:

“So it’s actually not even my prayer that I’m entering into. It’s actually God inspiring this. And so as I sit in the chapel, as I sit in my place of prayer, I first calm down and remind myself that God is the one leading me here.

I recall my first spiritual director was a Dominican back in California, and I was complaining to him, “Father, I really don’t know how to pray very well. I’m really not good at this. I really want to be better at this.” And he said, “Stop, Anthony.” He said, “Do you realize that even your desire for prayer is already God working within you?” And I said, “No.” I’d never thought of that. So I need to acknowledge that God has even brought me here that he wants to enter. He’s the initiator of this dialogue.

I need to have the Copernican Revolution, huh? Where my focus is on what God is doing. God’s brought me here. God’s sustaining me in existence right now. So I’m acknowledging what he’s doing and that there isn’t other here with a capital O. And so, I’m entering into this dialogue. Before I enter into the desire, and let’s see, what are the steps of my prayer that I’m going to do today? My prayer? Oh no. It’s an acknowledgement that I’m in the presence of an other who’s drawn me here. I have been drawn here, and I’m grateful for that. I’m grateful for my faith life, which has been complete gift.”

HSE5 – Our Identity & Relationship in Christ – The Heart of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola with Fr. Anthony Wieck S.J. – Discerning Hearts Catholic Podcasts

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Our Identity & Relationship in Christ – The Heart of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola with Fr. Anthony Wieck S.J.

An excerpt from the conversation:

“So that’s what the spiritual exercises are, five forms of prayer, to help us be free, to help us enter into dialogue with the Lord, to help facilitate that encounter. What is the grounding now? And here’s where I’d like to focus today, if we may. What is the grounding of the spiritual exercises? How are they grounded? St. Ignatius calls this the principle and foundation, and he literally means that these are deep, fundamental or pillars, deep shafts, pylons, thrust into the earth, thrust into the rock, who is Christ upon which a solid spiritual edifice can be built.

So the principle and foundation holds true for all men and women. This is not unique to the charism of Ignatian spirituality. This is regardless of any spirituality or particular sense of God. It’s not a “Catholics only” proposition either. It’s for all Christians, for all men and women of every race, nationality, and tongue. To live from this principle and foundation, it begins, St. Ignatius says, that man is created for a purpose. We are created. Ignatius, by this assertion, uproots any false foundation which underlies most of our self-understanding today in the world. Namely, that we create ourselves, that we pick ourselves up by the bootstraps, we’re self-made American men and women. That’s nonsense, we’re created by God. This is an ongoing creation.”