First Principle and Foundation

When we say "indifferent", we do not mean apathy but rather Karl Rahner’s definition of indifference as a kind of removal or distance away from things that make true vision possible and is required for proper decision.  This indifference does not exist for its own sake but is the choice of what is most conducive to the end.  It is freedom for making a decision according to God’s will.

The influence of previously held views keeps us from having this indifference and consequently from being able to make a free decision.

It is the exact opposite of unconcern or apathy.  St. Ignatius is not inculcating insensibility to natural desires.  He is not aiming at a person without human loves, but one in whom all other loves are so informed by God’s love that they cannot keep their hold on the heart if they are separated from it.  So indifference means that I do not incline one way or the other in a decisive manner until I have discerned the will of God.

This does not come about through good will alone, or by saying that I am indifferent nor is it the resolution not to let myself be carried along by the crowd: it demands rather the existential distance from things that frees the will to reject its own previous prejudices.  It means that I dispose myself, seeding a poised freedom... "the eyes of the handmaid are on the hands of the master" kind of freedom.