In the Ignatian way of thinking, work is immensely important. We don’t work just to pay the bills, to exercise our talents, to have a career, or get wealthy enough to retire. We work for the grandest of reasons—“for the greater glory of God” (ad majorem Dei gloriam) and for the humblest of reasons—helping souls. Work is a path to holiness. We find Christ in the work we do. We become more like him as we labor alongside him, doing our part in his work of saving and healing the world. As William Barry says, “Jesus did not give us a list of truths to affirm but a task to carry out.”
Ignatius’s favorite metaphor for working was “laboring the in the vineyard.” It’s a pleasant picture: tending the vines in the Mediterranean sun, patiently watching grapes come to fruition. Working in the Lord’s vineyard is the predominant image for the ministry of the Jesuits in the Constitutions of the Jesuit order. Ignatius’s secretary said he worked on the Constitutions sitting at a small table in a garden. We can imagine Ignatius sitting at his table, searching for an image of Ignatian ministry, seeing a gardener nearby, tending grapevines.
“Vineyard” was where Ignatius wound up. It was his third metaphor for work.
In the early years, he imagined his work as fighting a battle. After all, he’d been a soldier for a time, a good one, a lucky one. The cannon ball at Pamplona didn’t kill him, but wounded him, laid him up for a year so he could hear God inviting him to a different way of life. Martial imagery came easily to him. The newly-converted Ignatius threatened to kill a Moor who had insulted the Virgin Mary. A good knight, he dedicated himself to God’s service by laying his sword on the alter at Montserrat. The formal charter for the Jesuits of 1550 invites those wishing “to serve as a soldier of God” to join “a militia for Christ.”
But the soldier idea faded and Ignatius came to think of himself as a pilgrim. That’s how he described himself in his Autobiography. Many statues of him depict him with one foot raised—a man in mid-journey, striding off to the next thing. Jesuits think of themselves that way. “The world is our house,” said Jerome Nadal, Ignatius’s chief deputy. “Jesuits are in their most peaceful and pleasant house when they are constantly on the move, when they travel throughout the earth, when they have no place to call their own.” It’s enjoyable to think of ourselves and pilgrims and our lives as pilgrimages. We’re on the move in a constantly changing world, moving from experience to experience, job to job, learning new things, not overly distressed when we wander into a dead end or cul-de-sac, always ready for something new, cherishing the journey.
But soldier and pilgrim have their limitations as metaphors. Warfare and fighting aren’t great images for compassionate Christian service, and the pilgrimage idea can easily be taken too far. Journeys shouldn’t go on forever; the pilgrim eventually needs to settle down and do some work.
Working in a vineyard fits the kind of work most of us do. The vineyard worker nurtures a deep and mysterious process of organic growth that has a life of its own. The vines will bear fruit if the conditions are right. It’s the worker’s job—actually the job of a team of workers—to create the right conditions: to water and weed, to prune, to protect the vines from drought and wind and hail and pests. That’s a good way to think about any kind of teaching, managing, parenting—helping others develop into the people they’re meant to be. It’s a good way to think about doing a humble job in a large organization—or an organization of any size, for that matter.
In the Ignatian imagination, the vineyard is huge and plentiful—the whole world. There’s all kinds of work to be done. We’re “dispersed throughout Christ’s vineyard to labor in that part of it which has been entrusted to them,” as Ignatius wrote. Preference goes to those part of the vineyard where no work is being done or being done badly. He work is hard. The sun is hot. You’re in it for the long haul. But if you’re patient, if you stick with it and do your job, chances are that the results will be good. Vineyard workers are optimists. You may not see results for a while, but they’ll come, and when they do it will be a bountiful harvest.
Excellent insights, thank you Jim.
Thanks Jim for the insight into work in the vineyard
Wendy