LAYWOMEN AND SPIRITUAL EXERCISES. CASE STUDY: FIRST ADULT CHRISTIAN LIFE COMMUNITY IN CHILE (1975-2015). A GENDER PERSPECTIVE READING

Abstract

This article seeks to facilitate some results of a theological research that was proposed to address the witness of laywomen belonging to the first Adult Christian Life Community in Chile and other women linked with them through Spiritual Exercises. This research was carried out through qualitative method and case study approach. It has been undertaken as part of the program Theology of the signs of the times, within the framework of Manuel Larraín Theological Center-Pontifical Catholic University of Chile and Alberto Hurtado University. This text looks for a deepening between the relationship of certain elements of truth proposed by the Second Vatican Council –Church, the renewal of religious life, laity and the service to the poor– and the life of the Church, particularly the local Church. The reading includes a gender perspective because women can be considered as an emerging ecclesiological subject in the post-Vatican II and it helps to explore the reception of this council from this point of view. It is proposed a theological reflection, based on life histories in relation to the experience and the transmission of the spirituality of the Exercises, within the framework of the growing collaboration between Jesuits and laity in the Society of Jesus in the last decades. The chosen narratives show the interrelation between the spiritual accompaniment offered by Jesuits and laity in the Spiritual Exercises, the Christian Life Communi­ties (CLC), the Center of Ignatian Spirituality (CEI) and various apostolic works.