If you have an interest in young adult work, take a look at this video about Charis, an Ignatian ministry that is expanding rapidly.  Becky Eldredge, a dotMagis blogger and a leader of Charis, appears on it. (Click here to watch it on YouTube.)

Pilgrims are now walking and biking the new Ignatian Way pilgrimage route in northern Spain, which follows the route Ignatius walked in 1522 after his conversion.  (Go here to read what I wrote about it last year.)   After watching this video about it, I was ready to stuff my backpack, lace up my hiking boots, and book my flight.   (Click here to see the video on Vimeo.)

The final contemplation of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius is the Contemplation on Divine Love, or the Contemplation on the Love of God. It captures all of the movements we’ve been praying through during our retreat in daily life.

In the video below, Kevin O’Brien, SJ, explains the exercise as contemplating God’s love, which is given to us so freely and generously. We are first asked to contemplate how God creates out of love, creates everything in this world and our very lives, and sustains everything by God’s labor and God’s love. We are called to see all things as a reflection of God’s love and give gratitude. And that gratitude should inspire in us a natural response to give back.

This video is part of An Ignatian Prayer Adventure, Week 8. If you’re receiving this via e-mail, click through to watch the video The Contemplation on Divine Love.

Gratitude is the key to Ignatian spirituality and the topic for my final video for An Ignatian Prayer Adventure. The Spiritual Exercises end with a vision of generosity and gratitude called the Contemplation to Attain the Love of God. How can we respond?

If you’re receiving this via e-mail, click through to watch the Week 8 video Gratitude.

Easter isn’t a happy ending. It’s a new beginning. Easter is an incredible surprise. No one was expecting it, but it happened. Jesus rose from the dead, and a new creation was born, starting with Jesus but intended for the whole world. We are summoned to get on board. Let’s have a party!

Enjoy an Easter greeting video from all of us at Loyola Press:

In the Spiritual Exercises, Ignatius Loyola teaches ways to pray with our feelings. Engaging our emotions in prayer is key for conversion and discernment. I explain in today’s video contribution to An Ignatian Prayer Adventure.

If you’re receiving this via e-mail, click through to watch the Week 7 video Praying with Your Feelings.

Kevin O’Brien, SJ, explains that the Third Week of the Spiritual Exercises is an extended meditation on the passion, suffering, and death of Jesus Christ. This week can be difficult, because we are accompanying our friend Jesus Christ whom we have gotten to know throughout the Exercises, through our days of prayer. We are accompanying our Lord in suffering and in death.

But we are not to inflict amnesia on ourselves, because we know as Christians that the shadows of Good Friday will yield to the dawn of Easter morning. And so the suffering and death of Jesus must always be remembered and lived in context of the hope that springs eternal, the hope of Easter morning.

This video is part of An Ignatian Prayer Adventure, Week 7. If you’re receiving this via e-mail, click through to watch the video Accompanying Jesus in His Passion and Death.

What kind of relationship do you have with God? Think about the possibility of having a friendship with God. That’s our topic in today’s video contribution to An Ignatian Prayer Adventure.

If you’re receiving this via e-mail, click through to watch the Week 6 video Friendship with God.

A key meditation of the Spiritual Exercises is the meditation on the Two Standards. At this point in the Exercises we’ve reckoned with both our hopes and our failings; we’ve reckoned with our sin and also the redemptive grace, the mercy of God.

And here we’re presented with a stark contrast—The Two Standards. Which will you choose?

This video is part of An Ignatian Prayer Adventure, Week 5. If you’re receiving this via e-mail, click through to watch the video Kevin O’Brien, SJ, on the Two Standards.

TED is a nonprofit devoted to spreading good ideas.  It does this mainly through conferences featuring short talks, which are then published on the web.  Here is a very good one by an academic researcher whose motto was “if you can’t measure it, it doesn’t exist.” She was disconcerted when her data showed that this simply isn’t true. (Watch it here if you’re getting this post by email.)