Esdac means: Spiritual Exercises for Apostolic Discernment in Common. An abbreviation of the French Exercices Spirituels pour un Discernement Apostolique en Commun, it quickly became known as ‘Esdac’.

Esdac is a Christian, Ignatian and international association at the service of communion and group discernment. It developed in Belgium and other countries from 1995.

Esdac draws its inspiration from the tradition of the Spiritual Exercises of St Ignatius of Loyola and draws on developments from the human sciences and group dynamics.

Esdac is at the service of any group (communities, couples, religious families, work groups, parishes…) looking for communion, reconciliation amongst its members, finding or renewing its identity, vocation and mission in the world, listening to and collaborating with the action of the Spirit of God. We are careful to adapt to each specific situation.

Esdac proposes formations in spiritual conversation and discernment in common.

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8 days ESDAC training/retreat in April in Rome. We were 24 participants + a team of 4 facilitators, from 19 countries.  11 Jesuits, 17 women whose 2 from the Lutheran denomination (both of Ignatian spirituality, one is a priest). "Learning by doing" was the motto.  Personal prayer, sharing in small groups and in plenum.  One participant said : "I thought it would be a training... I made a retreat".  As we did not live or work together, we had no communal decision to take, but we developed a way to become a "corporate person".  We received tools to empower the groups, teams, couples, communities we belong to. During the session we had a presentation by John Dardis about the importance of communal discernment in the Society of Jesus. ESDAC is an international team of facilitators leading communal discernment retreats and organizing trainings in communal discernment.  If you are interested, have a look at www.esdac.net.