Solitude. Austerity. Sacrifice. — Prayer. Fasting. Almsgiving. From the Early Centuries’ Christian monks and nuns, we take up their practice in our Forty Days of Desert: Lent. To become living witnesses of the Crucified Lord, take your inspiration from them, who here along the Red Sea, became the “new martyrs” through their humble life of manual work and poverty, freed from distractions.

The founder of Christian monasticism, both east and west, Anthony the Abbot, left his noble family at age eighteen to enter an internal, spiritual struggle for solitude with the Lord. On this day of our Virtual Pilgrimage, he is reminding us that living our Christian vocation, which is both simple and magnificent, will allow us to leave the mundane of the world behind to yield to God’s will. St. Anthony the Great, pray for us!