Michael Creavey's Blog, page 3

Authentic Love

Last Friday we commemorated the 43rd anniversary of Pope St. John Paul II's instillation as Bishop of Rome on October 22, 1978. In his first encyclical letter, Redemptor Hominis ("The

Redeemer of Man"), John Paul wrote:

Man cannot live without love. He remains a being that is incomprehensible for himself. His life is senseless if love is not revealed to him, if he does not encounter love, if he does not experience it and make it his own, if he does not participate intimately in it. This is why C...

Following The Way

How important, really, is it for us to discern God's calling in our lives? Does it make a great and significant difference if I live as an attorney, an athlete, or a priest? How specific a call does the Lord intend for us and how are we to determine this?

These are difficult questions to answer. Some people (perhaps most) think of a "calling" in terms of an occupation, and surely this can be an important dimension. But to focus primarily or even exclusively on the occupational aspect of a callin...

FEAR NOT!

How are we to deal with the phenomenon of fear in our lives? Large or small, fear seems to so assuredly find its way into every nook and cranny of life that even our hopes and dreams become infected by its presence. We are surrounded by fear, a dark cloud that obscures our vision and impedes our faith in Divine Providence.

Fear manifests itself in so many ways. But at its core, I think it amounts to a mere shadow, a vaporous emptiness that constantly weaves for itself a mask of authority and pow...

How's Your Foundation?

"I don't like sand. It's all coarse, and rough, and irritating. And it gets everywhere..." - Anakin Skywalker

Two things happened to me recently upon recalling these catastrophically unforgettable words from Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones. The first is what happens every time. I dry-heaved a little bit.

The second, unprecedented and far more spiritually significant, was an immediate urge to meditate on Jesus' teaching on the contrasting foundations: one of stone, one of sand. Here'...

Come to the Fountain

Beautiful second reading from yesterday's Office of Readings - a commentary on the Diatessaron by Saint Ephrem (306-373 AD). I had just been spontaneously praying about hungering and thirsting not for spiritual junk, but rather only for that which truly nourishes the heart, soul, and mind.

Lo and behold, in reflecting upon the infinite riches of God's Word, Ephrem writes:

A thirsting man is happy when he is drinking, and he is not depressed because he cannot exhaust the spring. So let this sprin...

"I Await the Dawn..."

We've all heard the famous saying from English theologian Thomas Fuller "The darkest hour is just before the dawn", and many of us have perhaps never prayed harder for that to be the case.

When all you can see is bleakest night all around you, fix your eyes on the horizon. When you hear from that same pitch darkness the rising clamor of angry, accusatory, deceptive, blasphemous voices assaulting you and all that you hold most dear, fix your eyes on the horizon. When the avatars of the Enemy of...

Epiphany and the Dawning Light

The Feast of the Epiphany is traditionally celebrated on January 6th and commemorates the visit of the Magi to the newborn King of Kings. Wikipedia includes an interesting etymological breakdown of the word "Epiphany" itself:

"From Koine Greek ἐπιφάνεια, epipháneia, meaning manifestation or appearance. It is derived from the verb φαίνειν, phainein, meaning "to appear." In classical Greek it was used for the appearance of dawn, of an enemy in war, but especially of a manifestation of a deity to a ...

Isaiah 61: GOOD News of Deliverance

I asked the LORD in prayer this morning for some confirmation in what I believe He's been saying to me lately. Here's what I got in today's first "Office of Readings" selection from Scripture:

The spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me; he has sent me to bring good news to the oppressed, to bind up the brokenhearted to proclaim liberty to the captives, and release to the prisoners; to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor, and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfo...

How's Your Faith? (Hebrews 3:7-19)

Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says, “Today, when you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion, on the day of testing in the wilderness, where your fathers put me to the test

and saw my works for forty years. Therefore I was provoked with that generation, and said, ‘They always go astray in their hearts; they have not known my ways.’ As I swore in my wrath,

‘They shall never enter my rest.’

”Take care, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading...

God's Deliverance

Wonderfully powerful and inspiring Psalm to kick off today's Office of Readings:

PSALM 107

“O give thanks to the Lord for he is good;

for his love endures for ever.”

Let them say this, the Lord’s redeemed,

whom he redeemed from the hand of the foe

and gathered from far-off lands,

from east and west, north and south.

Some wandered in the desert, in the wilderness,

finding no way to a city they could dwell in.

Hungry they were and thirsty;

their soul was fainting within them.

Then they cri...