The Desert Fathers -The Toast

ANTHONY THE GREAT: let’s all move to the desert
there’s more God where sand is

PACHOMIUS THE GREAT: what if we all lived alone
but together

ANTHONY THE GREAT: what

PACHOMIUS THE GREAT: obviously mostly alone
but maybe a LITTLE bit together
so we don’t all have to build our own wells

ANTHONY THE GREAT: spiritually I don’t even want to talk about any food that isn’t bread
the greatest prayer of all is shutting up

DIOCLETIAN: more like the Desert Bothers

ATHANASIUS: [braids rope in total silence] ah man God’s gonna love this

BROTHERS: father Anthony
please give us your wisdom
instruct us
speak to us

ANTHONY THE GREAT: never
…you’re welcome

MACARIUS: I don’t want to talk to ANYONE who isn’t God
or maybe a bird God sent to visit me
or another monk who has seen a God-bird and wants to tell me about it
but that’s IT

PAUL OF THEBES: i’m going to go build a hut by myself and spend the rest of my life not leaving God alone

PAUL OF THEBES: God
God
God
hi God
hello God
hi God hi
God
God are you still there
hi God
God
God
God
God it’s me your old pal Paul of Thebes

SIMEON STYLITE: brothers it’s VERY important to God that i live on the smallest place there is
this sand isn’t enough anymore
gotta sit up on a stone wall and hurl prayers at God til he sends birds after me

ANTHONY THE GREAT: excuse me, fellas
gotta go look at some demons with my stern face
turn em into smoke
show em what’s what

DISCIPLE OF ARSENIUS THE GREAT: more like Ar-sinlessness the Great

MONK #1: you know what i hate

MONK #2: what

MONK #1: cities
and fellowship
living near someone

MONK #2: oh my wow
me too

MONK #1: oh wow

MONK #2: we have so much in common

MONK #1: ok well see you next year

MONK #2: talk then

JOHN COLOBOS: [silently basket-weaving] gonna fill this with holiness

HILARION: what is this
TWO cloaks?
what am I
the emperor??
i’ve only got one body and one God
what do I need two clothes for

Mallory is an Editor of The Toast.

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+78 Vote up Vote down

gavinbyrnes 143p · 477 weeks ago

i love you. i'm not even going to try to make a joke or add on to this.

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1 reply · active 477 weeks ago

+100 Vote up Vote down

Rillquiet 118p · 477 weeks ago

Also sprach Geoffrey Chaucer: "Ich once stayid in a stylite cloister. It was tops."

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+134 Vote up Vote down

sednarea51 128p · 477 weeks ago

"spiritually I don’t even want to talk about any food that isn’t bread" forget the Bible, this is the ancient teaching that speaks to me. bread or gtfo

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+46 Vote up Vote down

bighairnoheart 123p · 477 weeks ago

I'm pretty sure Monk #1 and #2's conversation is my mother's goal when it comes to human interactions. Seriously. I think aspiring to hermitude is in the blood.

Don't like cities or fellowship or living near someone?

Move to a mountain in Vermont.

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6 replies · active 476 weeks ago

+37 Vote up Vote down

popelizbet 109p · 477 weeks ago

In my current faith crisis I have become Paul of Thebes, and it's bugging me so it's nice to read this and laugh about it instead.

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2 replies · active 477 weeks ago

+5 Vote up Vote down

RamekinRamekin 110p · 477 weeks ago

This is just perfection. Thank you!!

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+75 Vote up Vote down

Deborah · 477 weeks ago

It was the favourite most obvious pun in my undergraduate divinity days to refer to Simeon Stylite's days as the high point of monasticism.

We were all so witty.

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+101 Vote up Vote down

crawlkill 129p · 477 weeks ago

monks really need to learn some texting discipline. maybe God's just not that into you? you gotta pray hard to get, man.

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4 replies · active 477 weeks ago

+93 Vote up Vote down

Hepzebah 122p · 477 weeks ago

"the greatest prayer of all is shutting up"
truer words were never spoken
shutting up now

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1 reply · active 477 weeks ago

+23 Vote up Vote down

rawrbook 125p · 477 weeks ago

I should've know the name "HILARION" wasn't made up

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2 replies · active 477 weeks ago

+52 Vote up Vote down

tabbylavalamp 149p · 477 weeks ago

I find it difficult to believe all these Men Went Their Own Way without complaining about women all the time.

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2 replies · active 477 weeks ago

+35 Vote up Vote down

lesliejroot 116p · 477 weeks ago

I went to Episcopal kindergarten, and our Bible Time featured lamb and lion puppets named Agnes and Athanasius. I loved them so much that my parents got me my own lion and lamb stuffed toys that I named the same names (I still have them). I finally got the Agnes pun years later and it slayed me, but I never knew who Athanasius was and now I am going to go look him up. #coolstory

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3 replies · active 477 weeks ago

+45 Vote up Vote down

Kathleen · 477 weeks ago

This is fantastic. And I think it might be time for a Judy Blume style, "Are You There, God? It's Me, Paul of Thebes."

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+54 Vote up Vote down

Unreadaethel 127p · 477 weeks ago

Oh fuck, this reminds me that I have a sermon to write. For tomorrow. I haven't looked at the lectionary in about a month, so I don't even remember what my readings are, but I think they're all about sin and how it's terrible.

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29 replies · active 476 weeks ago

+21 Vote up Vote down

walrathem 106p · 477 weeks ago

I really think the who stylite fad thing is just so very, very *odd*. I'm not sure where it came from or how it stopped being popular I mean, I get the history part of it but psychologically I don't see how it caught on.

From the Wikipedia: "There seems no reason to doubt that it was the ascetic spirit manifested in such examples as these which spurred men on to devise new and more ingenious forms of self-mortification."-- Yeah, I think that it wasn't the ascetic spirit I think YouTube hadn't been invented yet so they couldn't film themselves doing crazy stunts.

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6 replies · active 477 weeks ago

+61 Vote up Vote down

nopemobile 125p · 477 weeks ago

what do I need two clothes for

Thank you, Mallory, for the mental picture of a bunch of monks running around the desert naked every laundry day. I shall treasure it always.

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2 replies · active 477 weeks ago

+48 Vote up Vote down

alula_auburn 106p · 477 weeks ago

"the greatest prayer of all is shutting up."

Honestly sometimes I totally am onboard with this.

Although I believe I learned via a previous Mallory post Anthony the Great had servants with him, and I still feel that surely a hermit who takes servants is not a hermit in whom one can have complete confidence.

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2 replies · active 477 weeks ago

+55 Vote up Vote down

twoburgers 95p · 477 weeks ago

I very desperately need a sign/framed cross stitch that says "the greatest prayer of all is shutting up."

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4 replies · active 477 weeks ago

+17 Vote up Vote down

bird_internet 123p · 477 weeks ago

For some reason the words "cenobitic" and "eremetic" have lodged themselves into my vocabulary. I've never had a reason to use either, and this is probably the closest I'll ever get.

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1 reply · active 477 weeks ago

+29 Vote up Vote down

ChloeKEvil 129p · 477 weeks ago

None of these guys had a patch on St. Mary of Egypt, whose life story was the first place I learned the word 'fornication' from.

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2 replies · active 477 weeks ago

+26 Vote up Vote down

sueyres 153p · 477 weeks ago

I'm not saying there's a direct link between climate and temperament, but once you visit any desert it becomes exceedingly clear why all the Abrahamic religions began in a sweltering, dusty moonscape.

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2 replies · active 477 weeks ago

+31 Vote up Vote down

renegadeoboe 138p · 477 weeks ago

Athanasius, just making friendship bracelets for God. Like you do.

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+22 Vote up Vote down

gclouts 126p · 477 weeks ago

"TWO cloaks?
what am I
the emperor??
i’ve only got one body and one God
what do I need two clothes for"

This might be the funniest thing I have ever read

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+6 Vote up Vote down

Amberlyza 122p · 477 weeks ago

So now my two totally inappropriate whiny-dude crushes are in a battle to the death over sand.

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+12 Vote up Vote down

cleoreads 105p · 477 weeks ago

I once had the privilege of driving famous monk and big fan of the Desert Fathers, Fr Thomas Keating around for the afternoon when he was in town (I got a little lost but he was very gracious about it).

I proudly told him that my centering prayer group was reading a book about the wisdom sayings of the desert fathers and mothers. He asked me why we chose that and what we were getting out of it, and I was like, umm.....idk?

I get that the wisdom sayings are like zen koans and I have the same problem with those too - I'm too literal to get the spiritual message.

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+11 Vote up Vote down

l'inconnue · 477 weeks ago

This is amazing and beautiful and Bede is either laughing his head off or spinning in his grave, possibly both, along with a large number of fellow western hagiographers.

Will there be a Desert Mothers edition?

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+6 Vote up Vote down

mydonkeyfeet 103p · 477 weeks ago

I adore the woven basket filled with holiness.

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+4 Vote up Vote down

shaqattaq32 94p · 477 weeks ago

"The greatest prayer of all is shutting up."

My new motto!!!

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+1 Vote up Vote down

mialro12 83p · 477 weeks ago

Macarius. Same.

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+1 Vote up Vote down

LezzyBeaverman 94p · 477 weeks ago

"Well you know the old saying, where there's sand...."

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+5 Vote up Vote down

smiavs 95p · 477 weeks ago

Hilarion's right. Everyone knows godly folk need two PENS, not two clothes.

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1 reply · active 477 weeks ago

+3 Vote up Vote down

frankie0darling 140p · 477 weeks ago

what is this
TREES??
and GRASS
i'm a cenoBITE not a cenoLITE, meredith

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+1 Vote up Vote down

al3ab-banat01 87p · 463 weeks ago

نجدد ترحابنا بكم في العاب بنات التي تعتبر من افضل الالعاب على الاطلاق وعندها جمهور كبير جدا وهي بدورها تتضمن التلبيس والمكياج وكذلك الطبخ وتلعبها البنات بكترة واصبحت مشهورة جدا في السنين الاخيرة مما جعل مواقع الالعاب تصبح كتيرة وهناك كتير منها مشهورة متل فرايف و كيزي ومواقع اخرى كما ان هناك ايضا موقع جميل عربي يقدم تشكيلة من العاب بنات مميزة ومتجددة يوميا هذا النوع بدوره يشمل اصناف كتيرة سنتعرف عليها الان ومن بينها العاب الطبخ الدي يملك معجبين كتر جدا ويعتبر هو الاول تم يليه العاب التلبيس وهذا الآخر ممتع ويحبه الكتير لان التلبيس تعشقه البنات اكتر من الاولاد وهذا امر بديهي ومعروف وبعده بالتتابع يوجد العاب المكياج او الميك اب نوع جميل ومحبوب عند الصغار والكبار ويبقى في الاخير نوع قص الشعر وهو الاقل اهتماما

The Desert Fathers

ByDaniel Mallory Ortberg

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