Testimony for the 1st CER Alumni Fellowship at the Church of St. Ignatius, 17 May 2018
I was in CER 36, about 4.5 years ago. At that time, I had spent 3 years
discerning the religious vocation after my conversion experience. But the search for a religious
congregation to join was tougher than I had expected. Over time, prayer became dry and I felt so lost, discouraged and
spiritually dead.
I resisted going for CER initially
because I loved the silent retreats that I was making! But I went eventually because I was so desperate for a spiritual
resuscitation. God did bring me back
to life in the retreat.
After CER, I was
pretty much on a high I think like almost everyone else. And then came the question of what CSC ministry to join. Because of the fire of zeal I felt after
the retreat, and the comforting
sentiments of being back in CSC where I encountered Jesus so deeply, I was
very eager to get involved, to stay connected with the CSC environment. And so I joined the healing ministry.
The ministry members are truly lovely
people. But I soon began to notice
various practices, underlying values and beliefs within CSC at that time that
didn’t quite align with my beliefs and reflect the God I have come to know. The politics and strained relationships
between persons that saw no improvement led me to wonder if God has really been
taken seriously, and if He’s not, then what was the service really about? I became quite disillusioned and
frustrated.
Only recently, I realized that I was
the one who was not ready to accept imperfections, respect where people are and
love them anyway. I’ve been seeking
perfection as a way of protecting myself from getting hurt by imperfections. Simply because I was very hurt in my
earlier days by people’s imperfections. So
I wasn’t ready to work alongside anyone because I would just end up judging
them and getting very frustrated. And
then, I would get upset with myself for being judgmental, and that made me
feel too unworthy for God’s love. This
was a very big obstacle in my relationship with God.
On hindsight, I really should have discerned
more carefully the call to join another ministry as I was already serving here
in the parish. I realised what I
needed most at that time was actually to focus more on God, on deepening my relationship with Him, being more disciplined in my daily
prayer, aligning more consciously my
priorities and values with God’s; in
short, paying more attention to my interior life and building that up
first, rather than to distract myself with ministry and everything else that
comes with it. As Ignatius noted in
his rules for discernment of spirits, when in consolation – which I was in right
after the retreat – the soul frequently forms various resolutions and plans, which are not granted directly by God…
and which must be carefully examined before they are given full approval and
put into execution. Unfortunately, I
wasn’t quite aware of this back then.
Thankfully, I had the support and
guidance of spiritual mentors and companions, and more, deeper encounters with Jesus in
silent retreats on top of spiritual direction. I came to understand that CER is God’s tremendous gift to
personally encounter Jesus but alone, it is not enough for the spiritual
journey. Once that high is gone, the
Ignatian Spirituality has been another of God’s gift to continue growing my
interior life.
The Friday growth sessions, healing
Masses were external structures that gave me an aid, lifting me up emotionally
and spiritually when I felt down and tired. But relying on these external structures alone to give me a sense
of holiness and consolation in that moment didn’t take me very far. Interiorly, I needed to decide for
myself my level of focus on God and commitment to this journey. How serious am I when I say I want to
follow Christ? When I’m in a high,
it’s easy for me to say I love Him. I’ve
said that so many times. But when it
comes to the reality of my daily challenges, how much do I fight to keep my
word? And when I fail to love God in
others, and I’m once again faced with the ugliness of my human self, how much do
I trust in God’s unconditional love for me? These have been and still are very real questions in my journey.
Few months after joining the healing
ministry, God’s grace led me to the Good Shepherd Sisters (RGS), where I spent
3 years in pre-novitiate formation till late January this year. I learned to live with very different
people of different ages, cultures, personalities, worked in very humbling settings caring for abused women and later,
children who were abused or neglected. In
community and ministry, I had my buttons pushed in more ways than I liked. The sisters are very good people but no
one is perfect. And I’m certainly
not perfect either. And through it
all was the constant struggle to choose love over the easier and more familiar
tendencies.
When I was deeply hurt by my own
companions and formators, I had to face
my anger, my pain, disappointments, still
trying to keep my eyes on Jesus, holding myself back from reacting, and at
times, begging Jesus to move my
heart to forgiveness when all I could do was to sit in prayer helplessly angry,
confused, and crying out the pain. How
do I forgive when the other person isn’t even sorry? When she’ll continue to be the way she is? It was always a tug of
war inside. But once, Jesus said,
“Love needs no justification.” It was His
invitation to exchange my human logic and need for justice for God’s humanly illogical,
unconditional love. It was a choice
I had to make each time and choosing to forgive because I want to walk the talk
comes with a price; the painful price of discipleship.
On another note, through having my
buttons pushed, I became aware of what those buttons were and I could bring
them to God in prayer to listen to what He was trying to do in me. There’s a deeper reason why I was being
triggered – my old, unhealed wounds manifesting, and it was God wanting to
enter these painful memories to heal them and make me more and more whole.
And God took this healing even further.
Part of our journey towards
novitiate was to go through a psychological test. After which, the Jesuit Fr. Varghese who conducted the test for us
pushed this rather new idea real hard and my provincial very generously offered
for the first time as part of formation psychotherapy. It is not cheap and I’m most grateful for this. Not that we were found to be psychotic
but as Fr Varghese shared, the psychological tools developed are now so
advanced that being freed from our past wounds has become much more accessible
and easy. And it’s only for the sake
of freeing us up internally to be better ministers of God.
My therapist and I worked very hard in
the process and the results are beyond my imagination. I never expected to encounter Jesus so deeply in the therapy as I
normally would mostly in retreats.
After months of therapy, although we
did not cover every single wound in my life and I am still far from being
perfect, anger, frustration, fear,
insecurities, inadequacy – these
affected many of my relationships and were so much a part of my daily
struggles in the past – but they have
been greatly, greatly reduced.
Life situations have not changed but I have, and I can trust God’s love a lot more. I don’t feel as crippled by fears, which always took my eyes off
Jesus and made me forget He holds everything in His hands. Being much more
secure now, I was, in my retreat last month, finally able to hand over to Jesus
my need and obsession for perfection because I’m emotionally stronger to handle the threats of imperfections and
more than that, I feel safe enough to allow Jesus to take over the place as my
Protector, my Calm, my Confidence. I don’t need to
overprotect myself anymore.
I don’t know what you’ve been hearing
about my journey but I see a lot of struggles in my journey. And it doesn’t look like they’re ending.
At least not before death. But all
these struggles and growth would be absolutely impossible if not for God’s abundant
graces. I don’t know where I’d be
without God’s continuous working in my life. His faithfulness to me. And the
struggles would all be hopelessly depressing if not for a much greater
prize to gain – which is the gift of
greater intimacy with Jesus, the joy
that brings and the comfort of knowing my daily struggles are my spiritual
vitamins for growth. So my adventure
continues and I pray that yours is abundantly graced too.
