St Anthony - 17th January
It would be hard if not impossible to imagine the Church without religious orders. If we have sisters working in our parish or have been to one of the great Abbeys on retreat then we are well aware of this particular Christian vocation. Many of our ancient Cathedrals and some of our famous ruins were founded as religious houses. Without monks and nuns, sisters and friars our Church would be very impoverished.

It’s fitting then that we celebrate the man whose feast falls tomorrow. Anthony was born around the year 251 in upper Egypt. As a young man, Anthony heard the gospel about the rich young man at Mass one day and followed it literally as soon as he could. His parents had already died and having made provision for his younger sister, he sold all he had, gave it to the poor and set off to live a life of self-denial and prayer in the desert. Later on others came to join him and it was out of these gatherings of like-minded Christians that the first monasteries emerged.

Anthony seems to have lived to be over a hundred years old and his memory is honoured throughout the Christian world. We are all called to serve the Lord in different ways. We need to pray that Anthony will always have his followers, because their lives of prayer and contemplation are essential to the life of the Church. P.D.