The Art of Spiritual Direction: A Guide to Ignatian Practice

by Jos Moons SJ, Paul Nicholson (Foreword)

The Art of Spiritual Direction: A Guide to Ignatian Practice is a concrete, practical book on spiritual accompaniment resembling a toolbox with a user's manual, by Dutch Jesuit Fr. Jos Moons. Using concrete examples and case studies, he introduces tools to assist new and experienced spiritual directors in providing individual guidance in the Ignatian tradition. It can also be used in a wide variety of Christian settings. +

176 pages, Paperback

Published December 7, 2021

Reviews

[Brian Hohmeier · Rating 3 out of 5]

While Moons provides a quite good and helpful outline to the practical work of spiritual direction, I regret the actual methods and guidance demonstrated in his practical examples and dialogues. From the bias of my own approach, I find his overly fond of reflective statements, peculiarly reluctant to ask open-ended questions, and in the final estimation fairly unnatural. And unfortunately, while Moons is offering to provide "A Guide to Ignatian Practice," some of the small rules that seem to govern his model spiritual direction (sometimes acknowledged, sometimes not) seem to enter in unexamined and owing more to the influence of 20th-century schools of humanist counseling than to the distinctly Ignatian values he offers at the beginning.