Lesson 3

The Map to God

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Workbook Review Question Answers

Lesson Three

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1. What are the 3 stages of the spiritual life and what is their role?

Answer: The names of these three stages are the Purgative, Illuminative, and Unitive ways. They provide a roadmap of where we are in the spiritual life, how we get to God, and what we’re going to experience along the way. Just like the life of prayer, our entire movement toward God in the spiritual life isn’t random or haphazard. It follows a particular path. And the three stages are that path. They give us a kind of spiritual GPS to God.

2. What is the Purgative Way?

Answer: The first stage of the spiritual life is the initial purging or cleansing process. And this is needed because when we first move into the life of grace, we’ve got some major sins and bad habits that need to be dealt with. These must be cleared away before we’re ready to tackle the deeper cleansing and focus on virtue in the second stage. The Purgative Way is akin to spiritual childhood, the first steps we take towards God.

3. How do we get into the Purgative Way to begin with? 

Answer: You get into the first stage of the spiritual life through Baptism. That’s the point in which the Holy Spirit fills you with grace and you become one with the Mystical Body of Christ. Once you lose your baptismal innocence through sin, the sacrament of Confession (Reconciliation) is your doorway back in. These are the sacraments designed by God to bring us into—or restore us to—the life of grace. If you’re not joined to Christ, you’re not even in the Purgative Way. All of this assumes you are in right relationship with God through the sacraments.

4. What does St. Teresa of Ávila emphasize as a terrible danger in the early stages of the spiritual life?

Answer: She emphasizes the danger of mortal sin. In her famous book Interior Castle, she says, “O souls redeemed by the blood of Jesus Christ!...Remove the pitch which blackens the crystal.” She’s so forceful in her speech because she knows that early in the spiritual life we’re still extremely weak and the Devil is doing all he can throw us back into spiritual darkness.

5. How do we make war on sin and grow in the Purgative Way?

Answer: Through vocal prayer, meditation, and the sacraments. One of the fundamental precepts of the spiritual life is that you cannot separate prayer and spiritual growth. You especially need to have a daily time of meditative prayer on your schedule for God. This is so important because even in the Purgative Way your prayer life can really begin to grow and mature.

6. What sensation will we experience in our prayer life as we transition from the Purgative Way to the illuminative way?

Answer: Dryness in prayer is part of the transition between the first and second stages. St. John of the Cross calls this transition the “passive purification of the senses”, or the “night of sense”. Whereas you really felt the presence of God early on, at this point you begin to lose that sensation and ease of communion. The reason this happens is because God is beginning to work more deeply on you. Things get a little harder because he’s teaching you to grow up and seek him for who he is instead of what you feel or what good things you can receive from him.

7. What do we focus more upon once we enter into the illuminative way?

Answer: As we are illuminated by the light and love God in the Illuminative Way, we become more focused on pulling up the deeper weeds of sin, growing in serious virtue, and radically deepening our prayer life. This stage can be seen as a kind of spiritual adolescence. 

8. What do we become filled with in the Unitive way?

Answer: In the last stage of the spiritual life, our lives are full to the brim with the Holy Spirit. The graces received in seed form through the sacraments and prayer are in full bloom. We’re completely consumed with God. While we’ll never stop growing, we’ve reached spiritual adulthood.