Photo by Ganapathy Kumar, courtesy of Unsplash. For 20 years now, I have been heading from my native Vermont to the American West—Utah, Arizona, Nevada, Southern California—to hike and camp in the ...

Of the many great innovations that have been invented on these shores in the name of American liberty, one stands out for having brought spiritual formation and inspiration to millions of American ...

The podcast’s launch coincides with the Catholic Church’s 2025 Jubilee Year of Hope, which Bishop Varden sees as particularly significant. Bishop Erik Varden, OCSO, of the Catholic Territorial ...

‘Streams In the Wasteland: Finding Spiritual Renewal with the Desert Fathers & Mothers’ by Andrew Arndt. (Credit: Used by permission of NavPress..) Here’s a humorous story that illustrates their ...

We call them the Desert Fathers, though, certainly, there were women, Desert Mothers, among them. Beginning in the third century, these men and women retreated into the Egyptian desert. They were ...

Father Philotheos of St. Anthony’s monastery, Egypt (photo by Jan Ciglenecki, all photos courtesy the Heritage of the Desert Fathers) Constructed from stacked rocks and carved into remote ...

The Desert Fathers saw it as faith’s testing ground. The Transcendentalists saw it as sanctuary. The Gospel writers had their own views. I still recall my first encounter with the American wilderness, ...

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