by Claire Dwyer | Apr 25, 2024 | Discernment, Everyday Holiness, Present Moment, The Sacred Everyday
My friend and I were supposed to be strategizing, but we found ourselves commiserating. Working wives and moms of many, we had, in the past, diligently organized our little blocks of time. On paper, everything lined up in tiny, tidy squares. A time for this, a time...
by Claire Dwyer | Sep 14, 2023 | Discernment, Spiritual Direction
My husband, riffling through the junk drawer, held up a fistful of keys. “Don’t you think it’s time you returned these to the parish?” “I forgot about those,” I said thoughtfully as I put my coffee in the microwave for the third time that morning. There were many...
by Claire Dwyer | Aug 11, 2023 | Discernment
I’d prayed. Thought. Asked for advice. Researched. Considered. Reconsidered. My anxieties and misgivings (you can’t do this; you’ll fail and everyone will see you fail; this will take too much time away from your family) pushed against the growing sense that this was...
by Claire Dwyer | Apr 21, 2023 | Creativity, Discernment, Saints, Writing
It’s Mother Angelica’s birthday today, April 20. She was born 100 years ago—grew up in a broken home, struggled with various painful illnesses, and was desperately poor. When I read her biography by Raymond Arroyo years ago, I was struck by the resilience of the...
by Claire Dwyer | Mar 20, 2021 | Discernment, Spiritual Direction
After several years of regular spiritual direction, I’ve come more and more to realize the beauty of this relationship with someone which consistently serves to strengthen and deepen my own relationship with God. I’ve grown so much from the grace of accountability, of...
by Claire Dwyer | Nov 27, 2020 | Discernment, Present Moment, silence
Problems in the Parlor She was a young nun who loved the Lord and spoke of Him passionately and often, edifying others who saw in her the beginnings of the saint she would become. But St. Teresa of Avila admits early in her biography that she had a major fault: she...
