Jump to Any Step (6 of 36 · Click to Expand All 36 Days & Exercises)
01. The Presupposition & How to Enter the Exercises02. Principle and Foundation03. The Daily & Particular Examen04. Meditation with the Three Powers on the First, Second & Third Sin05. Meditation on Personal Sins & The Exclamation of Wonder at God’s Mercy06. Repetitions of the First & Second Exercises with the Triple Colloquy07. Meditation with the Five Senses on Ultimate Separation08. The Call of the Temporal King & The Oblation to the Eternal King09. The First Contemplation: The Incarnation10. The Second Contemplation: The Nativity & Application of the Five Senses11. The Presentation in the Temple & The Flight into Egypt12. The Hidden Life at Nazareth & Finding the Boy Jesus in the Temple13. Meditation on the Two Standards & Second Week Rules for Discernment14. Meditation on the Three Pairs of Men15. Departure from Nazareth & Baptism in the River Jordan16. Christ Fasting & Tempted in the Desert17. The Call of the Apostles & The Wedding at Cana18. The Sermon on the Mount19. Calming the Storm & Walking on the Waters20. Sending the Apostles, The Sinful Woman Forgiven, Feeding the 5,000, The Transfiguration & Preaching in the Temple21. The Raising of Lazarus & The Supper at Bethany22. Palm Sunday: The Humble Entry into Jerusalem23. The Three Manners of Humility24. Making an Election25. The Last Supper, Washing the Feet & The Agony in Gethsemane26. Betrayal, Arrest & The Night at the Houses of Annas and Caiaphas27. Christ Before Pilate & Before Herod28. The Scourging at the Pillar, Crowning with Thorns & ‘Ecce Homo’29. Carrying the Cross & The Crucifixion30. The Descent from the Cross, The Burial & The Silence of Holy Saturday31. The Resurrection: Christ Appears to His Mother & to Mary Magdalene32. The Road to Emmaus, The Appearance to St. Peter & The Upper Room33. St. Thomas’s Confession & Breakfast by the Sea of Galilee34. The Great Commission & The Ascension of Christ Our Lord35. Contemplation to Gain Love36. The Three Methods of Prayer
Movement I · The First Week (Purgative Way) · Step 6 · Week 1, Exercises 3 & 4
St. Ignatius of Loyola · Exx. 62–64

Repetitions of the First & Second Exercises with the Triple Colloquy

How to pray an Ignatian Repetition—returning only to the places where you felt consolation or desolation—and praying the Triple Colloquy to Our Lady, the Son, and the Father for three deep graces.

Assigned Scripture Reading (NIV) & Mystery Points

Scripture Reading: 1 John 2:15–17 · Psalm 130:1–8 · Romans 7:15–25

1 John 2:15–17 (NIV)
15Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, love for the Father is not in them. 16For everything in the world—the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life—comes not from the Father but from the world. 17The world and its desires pass away, but whoever does the will of God lives forever.
Psalm 130:1–8 (NIV)
1Out of the depths I cry to you, Lord; 2Lord, hear my voice. Let your ears be attentive to my cry for mercy. 3If you, Lord, kept a record of sins, Lord, who could stand? 4But with you there is forgiveness, so that we can, with reverence, serve you. 5I wait for the Lord, my whole being waits, and in his word I put my hope. 6I wait for the Lord more than watchmen wait for the morning, more than watchmen wait for the morning. 7Israel, put your hope in the Lord, for with the Lord is unfailing love and with him is full redemption. 8He himself will redeem Israel from all their sins.
Romans 7:15–25 (NIV)
15I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. 16And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. 17As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me. 18For I know that good itself does not dwell in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. 19For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing. 20Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it. 21So I find this law at work: Although I want to do good, evil is right there with me. 22For in my inner being I delight in God’s law; 23but I see another law at work in me, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within me. 24What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death? 25Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God’s law, but in my sinful nature a slave to the law of sin.

Points of the Mystery from St. Ignatius

Step 1 · Entering the Hour (2 Minutes)

Before You Start

Glance back at your journal notes from Steps 4 and 5. Identify the two or three specific moments where your heart felt most touched, pierced, comforted, or resistant. Stand for an Our Father, reverence the Lord, and pray the Preparatory Prayer (Exx. 46).

Step 2 · Orienting the Heart & Imagination (5 Minutes)

The Preludes

First Prelude · Composition of Place (Exx. 47)

Return to the foot of the Cross or the road of your life’s history where you met the Lord in the previous two exercises.

Second Prelude · Asking for What I Desire

Ask for a deeper interior relish of the truths that already touched you, and for the three graces of the Triple Colloquy: knowledge of sin, knowledge of my disordered patterns, and freedom from worldly vanity.

Step 3 · The Body of the Exercise (30–40 Minutes)

How to Pray a Repetition & The Triple Colloquy

Ignatius builds Repetitions into every Week because the first pass through a meditation often engages the head, while the repetition lets the truth sink into the marrow of the heart:

Part 1 · Dwell Where You Felt Consolation or Desolation (25–30 minutes, Exx. 62, 64)

Go back to the 2 or 3 moments from Exercise 1 or Exercise 2 that carried the strongest charge. For instance:

  • Perhaps it was one of the Three Questions at the Cross (“What is Christ calling me to do now?”).
  • Perhaps it was a specific house or season of your life in Exercise 2.
  • Perhaps it was the Exclamation of Wonder at being kept alive in love.

Do not try to think up new ideas. Simply sit inside that memory or image with the Lord, asking: “Lord, why did my heart stir right here? What more do You want to show me in this place?”

Part 2 · First Colloquy — To Our Lady (or Before the Cloud of Witnesses, Exx. 63)

Ignatius ends the Repetition with a Triple Colloquy—bringing the same three petitions first through the intercession of Mary (the Mother who stood at the foot of the Cross), then to Christ the Son, and finally to the Eternal Father. Ask for three specific things:

  • An interior knowledge of my sins, and a hatred of them.
  • To feel the disorder of my actions (where my good energies get tangled or out of order), that hating it I may amend and put myself in order.
  • A knowledge of the world (its obsession with status, wealth, appearance, and control), that hating its falseness I may put away from me worldly and vain things.

(Close this first colloquy with a Hail Mary or a quiet prayer of thanksgiving for the communion of saints.)

Part 3 · Second Colloquy — To the Son on the Cross (Exx. 63)

Turn directly to Jesus Christ our Mediator and Brother. Speak to Him friend to friend about those same three desires: show Him the disorder in your daily habits and the worldly vanities that still pull at you, and ask Him to obtain these three graces for you from the Father. Close with the Anima Christi (“Soul of Christ, sanctify me; Body of Christ, save me... Within Thy wounds hide me...”).

Part 4 · Third Colloquy — To the Eternal Father (Exx. 63)

Finally, turn directly to God the Eternal Father. Lay your whole life, your past, your disordered tendencies, and your desire for purity of heart before Him, asking that the Father Himself grant you these three graces. Close with an Our Father.

Step 4 · Friend to Friend & Looking Back (15–20 Minutes)

Colloquy, Post-Prayer Review & Repetitions

1. The Colloquy (5 Minutes)

The Triple Colloquy itself is the grand closing conversation of this exercise. Linger quietly in the Father’s presence after the final Our Father, resting in the assurance that He hears.

2. The Post-Prayer Examen of Prayer (15 Minutes · Exx. 77)

After finishing the Our Father, remain quiet for ten to fifteen minutes (sitting or walking slowly) to examine how your prayer went. Ask: Where did my heart feel warmed, expanded, drawn to trust, or moved to tears (consolation)? Where did I feel dry, distracted, defensive, or negotiating with God (desolation or resistance)? Write down two or three honest sentences in your notebook.

3. Repetitions & Carrying the Mystery Through the Day

Notice the second petition of the Triple Colloquy: “to feel the disorder of my actions, that I may amend and put myself in order.” For many sincere believers, the battle is no longer gross outward sin, but disordered order—putting good things in the wrong place, or striving in our own strength instead of abiding in love.

Primary Text · From St. Ignatius’s Spiritual Exercises (Exx. 62–64)
[62] After the Preparatory Prayer and two Preludes, it will be to repeat the first and second Exercise, marking and dwelling on the Points in which I have felt greater consolation or desolation, or greater spiritual feeling; after which I will make three Colloquies in the manner which follows: [63] First Colloquy. The first Colloquy to Our Lady, that she may get me grace from her Son and Lord for three things: first, that I may feel an interior knowledge of my sins, and hatred of them; second, that I may feel the disorder of my actions, so that, hating them, I may amend and put myself in order; third, to ask knowledge of the world, in order that, hating it, I may put away from me worldly and vain things. And with this a HAIL MARY. Second Colloquy. The second the same to the Son, that He may get for me from the Father these three things. And with this the Prayer ANIMA CHRISTI. Third Colloquy. The third the same to the Father, that the Eternal Lord Himself may grant them to me. And with this an OUR FATHER.
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