Holiness in Ignatius's Spiritual Exercises and Spenser's
In Book I of his epic poem The Faerie Queen, Edmund Spenser means to allegorize the Christian individual’s quest for holiness and, at the same time, give a commentary on the religious debate of his particular cultural moment. Spenser lived in post-reformation England, where Protestantism (particularly Anglicanism) had replaced Catholicism as the national religion. Furious with the disloyal Catholic propagandists that hindered English solidarity, Spenser uses the The Faerie Queen to relate his vision of a magnificent English empire reminiscent of the Arthurian days of old. This empire includes a unique national religion with the monarch (in the case of the poem, the Faerie Queen) as a religious and political protector, par excellence . Spenser’s critique of Catholicism includes but is not limited to criticism of: the superficiality of Catholic faith as works without God’s grace and the shortsighted and uncharitable nature of the Catholic monastic life. His understanding of Christian holiness, as the Redcrosse Knight represents it in Book I, is a heroic quest. In Spenser’s estimation, true holiness is a knight-like state of mind, and this holiness is earned by way of unwearied struggle versus the forc
The second prelude is to ask God our Lord for what I want and desire. The request must be according to the subject matter. Therefore, if the contemplation is on the Resurrection I shall ask for joy with Christ rejoicing; if it is on the passion, I shall ask for pain, tears, and suffering with Christ suffering. (54) In his introduction to the Spiritual Exercises, Ignatius recounts this soldierly method and goal of the Exercises:
Some topics in this essay:
Faerie Queen,
Redcrosse Knight,
Divine Majesty,
Spiritual Exercises,
Fundamentally Ignatius’s,
Crosse Holinesse”,
Knight Archimago,
Exercises Ignatius,
Abessa Coresca,
Book Catholic,
redcrosse knight,
faerie queen,
spiritual exercises,
christian individual,
god’s grace,
quest holiness,
soldierly holiness,
catholic asceticism,
faithful loves,
spenser’s critique,
quest towards holiness,
wars faithful loves,
ignatius’s spiritual exercises,
critique catholic asceticism,
fierce wars faithful,
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Approximate Word count = 3568
Approximate Pages = 14 (250 words per page double spaced)
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