Brian Grogan SJ points out that Ignatius’s visit to Jerusalem in September 1523 was a high point in his life. Ever after he was able to recall in imagination the scenes where the mysteries of Jesus’ life were acted out. This became a technique of prayer that he taught to others.
A few days before the ship’s departure from Venice to Cyprus, Ignatius was stricken with bouts of fever. The treatment he received was inadequate and on the very day of his departure he was given a purge. The doctor said that he could set sail, but only if his intention was to be buried en route. Ignatius, stubborn Basque that he was, boarded the ship. After a period of continuous vomiting, he began to feel better.
The ship, going at a snail’s pace because of the all-pervasive calm, took a whole month to arrive at Cyprus, where it finally touched shore on 14 August. All of this inactivity had fostered vice on board. The pilgrim chanced to see ‘some individuals engaged in openly lewd and obscene behaviour’, that is to say homosexual activity. Ignatius severely reproved the guilty individuals. The three other Spaniards aboard pleaded with him not to overreact because the crew were talking about dropping him off on some island. Soon after, however, they arrived at Famagusta in Cyprus.
At the port of Larnaca Ignatius embarked on another ship, with nothing more for sustenance than his hope in God. As a compensation, he had the vision of the nearness of Christ in the form of ‘a large round object, as though it were of gold’, and this bought him consolation and courage.
On 19 August, 1523, twenty-one pilgrims set sail from Cyprus and landed in Jaffa on the 31st. There, they sang the Te Deum and the Salve Regina. Then, accompanied by members of the Franciscan Order, which had the jurisdiction of pilgrims, and by an escort of Turkish troops to secure their safety in this closed, hostile Muslim world, they mounted small donkeys and made their way toward Jerusalem.
As the pilgrims approached Jerusalem, one of the four Spaniards among them announced that they were approaching the hill from where they would be able to see the Holy City for the first time. He recommended that all of them prepare their consciences for this event in silence. Just before arriving at the viewing spot, they came upon a number of Franciscans, one of whom was holding a cross on high. These had come from Jerusalem to welcome their arrival. The pilgrims dismounted their donkeys and proceeded on foot. ‘When the pilgrim saw the city, he experienced great consolation, and all the others affirmed that they experienced the same and they confessed that they felt a joy that did not seem natural.’
The pilgrim was overcome by an awe and fervour that never left him during all the time he visited the holy places. The group visited all the holy places in Jerusalem, and then left under the escort of Turkish soldiers for Jericho, and there they saw the Jordan River. Their last two days were spent in the Jerusalem hostel of Saint John.
Ignatius’s eyes drank in the landscape and what he saw was engraved forever on his memory. Later, in the Spiritual Exercises, he will give a direction about the ‘composition of place’, that is, about having the retreatants place themselves imaginatively in the actual place where the mystery unfolds. After the eyes have seen, the imagination does its work, and the spirit follows along the footsteps of Christ into those places hallowed by Him. Ignatius’s powerful sense of Christ found a particular spiritual nourishment in the very concrete setting where Jesus’ voice resounded and where he worked out our redemption. This longed-for Jerusalem pilgrimage meant more for Ignatius than performing a series of penitential devotions. It was an effort to grasp Christ, who, although no longer present in physical form in the places and the scenes associated with his historical, physical presence, became more ardently experienced each day within the heart of the pilgrim.
Ignatius desired with all his heart to remain for the rest of his days in these holy places; moreover, he secretly believed that his presence there could bring some help to others. He had brought Spanish letters of recommendation to this effect to the Father Guardian of the Franciscans, indicating that he wanted to remain in Jerusalem. But any missionary activity was all but impossible in this Muslim world. Even his plan to stay on in the Holy Land was impractical. The Franciscan House in Jerusalem was extremely poor, and the fathers there had even considered sending some of their own members back on the pilgrim ship. The pilgrim, however, asked only that he might come to them occasionally to make his confession.
On the evening before the group’s departure, the Franciscan Provincial dashed all his hopes. A man of great experience, he thought that Ignatius’s project was preposterous. Others who had tried to lead the type of life that he was proposing ended up either in prison or dead. Ignatius argued that he would assume responsibility for his own fate, but the Franciscan Provincial made him understand that he himself had the exclusive jurisdiction over those who came to Jerusalem, and that he could excommunicate anyone who refused to obey him. The pilgrim quietly accepted this painful decision.
To utilise his few remaining hours, he returned once again to the Mount of Olives to verify the direction of the feet in the stone believed to be imprinted with Christ’s footprint at the moment of His ascension. Without a word, and without even taking a guide, he slipped away from the others and went up to the place alone. He bribed the guards by giving them a pair of scissors.
Shortly afterward, the alarm spread throughout the hospice that he had disappeared. One of the servants went out to look for him and found him on the road. The servant was very angry, threatened him with a huge stick, grabbed him violently by the arm and brought him back to the hospice as if he were a criminal. During this event, the pilgrim felt the help and nearness of Christ in a most tangible way.
Finally, after an unforgettable stay of twenty days, the pilgrim left Jerusalem on the night of 23 September. He had fulfilled the greatest desire of his life, and he considered all of the inconveniences he had suffered worthwhile. For the moment, he had to give up the idea of living and dying in Palestine, accepting this as a manifestation of God’s will for him. His destiny was not to be found in Jerusalem as of now. Where, then, was it to be?
For Pondering:
Does it help you to use your imagination in reading the Gospel scenes? This article first appeared in The Messenger (April 2009), a publication of the Irish Jesuits.
