You, too, can become a saint.

Have you ever scrolled through your phone at 2 AM, knowing you should be sleeping, yet unable to resist the endless stream of notifications? Or perhaps you've sat in traffic, blood pressure rising, as someone cuts you off for the third time that morning? These moments—these seemingly insignificant daily battles—might be more important than we realize. What if I told you that your struggle to put down your phone, to hold your tongue in traffic, or to show patience with a difficult coworker could be placing you among the greatest spiritual warriors who have ever lived?

There's an ancient saying that comes to us from the Desert Fathers, those early Christian monastics who fled to the wilderness of Egypt and Syria in the third and fourth centuries. According to the Sayings of the Desert Fathers (Apophthegmata Patrum), it was prophesied:

 "In the last days the man who takes a piece of bread and eats it in the desert, giving thanks to God, will perform a great work. And the man who is able to hold his own place for one hour, resisting the temptations of the day, will be greater than the Fathers."

At first glance, this seems almost absurd. How could simply eating bread with gratitude or standing firm for a single hour compare to the heroic feats of the Desert Fathers themselves—men and women who spent decades in solitude, who battled demons, who fasted for weeks, who memorized entire books of Scripture? Yet these wise abbas and ammas, with their penetrating spiritual insight, saw something we often miss: that the intensity of spiritual warfare would increase as history progressed, making even the simplest acts of faithfulness profound victories.

 

The Escalating Battle

Consider the world of the Desert Fathers. Yes, they faced tremendous challenges—isolation, physical deprivation, spiritual attacks. But they also had something we lack: silence. Uninterrupted hours, days, years of silence in which to pray, to contemplate, to wrestle with God and themselves. They didn't have smartphones buzzing with notifications every thirty seconds. They didn't have twenty-four-hour news cycles flooding their minds with global catastrophes. They didn't have social media algorithms specifically designed to trigger outrage and addiction.

The fourth-century monk Evagrius Ponticus identified eight evil thoughts (later refined into the seven deadly sins) that afflicted monks: gluttony, lust, avarice, sadness, anger, acedia (spiritual sloth), vainglory, and pride. Today, we face these same temptations, but amplified and weaponized by technology and culture. Gluttony isn't just about food anymore—it's binge-watching, doom-scrolling, the insatiable consumption of content. Lust has been pornographized and made accessible with a single click. Vainglory finds its perfect expression in the carefully curated social media profile, where we craft false selves for the approval of strangers.

The Desert Fathers could flee to the wilderness to escape the world's temptations. Where can we flee? The wilderness has WiFi now. The desert has cell towers. Even our bedrooms, once sanctuaries of rest, have become battlegrounds where we wrestle with the blue light of our devices instead of the angels of God.

 

The Hidden Greatness of Ordinary Faithfulness

This is why the prophecy speaks of such simple acts—eating bread with thanksgiving, holding one's ground for an hour—as being "greater than the Fathers." The German theologian Romano Guardini observed that "the superabundance of stimuli and the weakening of the spiritual immune system" would characterize the modern age. In such an environment, maintaining even basic spiritual disciplines becomes heroic.

Think about what it means to "take a piece of bread and eat it in the desert, giving thanks to God" in our context. It might look like:

A parent saying grace with their children at dinner, despite exhaustion from a long workday.

A college student pausing before a meal in the cafeteria to silently thank God, while friends mock or ignore this practice.

An office worker eating lunch alone, choosing to spend that time in gratitude rather than scrolling through social media.

These acts seem trivial, yet they represent profound choices. In a world that has forgotten God, remembering Him is revolutionary. In a culture of entitlement and complaint, gratitude is countercultural. As Saint Paul wrote to the Thessalonians, "Give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you" (1 Thessalonians 5:18, ESV).

 

Standing Firm in the Digital Colosseum

What about "holding one's place for one hour"? The Greek word often translated as "stand firm" implies not just passive resistance but active engagement—maintaining one's position against opposing forces. In Ephesians 6:13, Paul uses a related term when he commands, "Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand firm" (ESV).

Today, standing firm for even one hour might mean:

Resisting the urge to check your phone during prayer or meditation.

Maintaining composure and charity during a hostile family gathering where your faith is mocked.

Refusing to participate in office gossip, even when silence makes you an outsider.

Staying faithful to your marriage vows when culture says personal happiness trumps commitment.

Continuing to attend worship when you feel nothing, when doubt assails you, when bed seems more appealing.

The early Christian writer Tertullian famously declared, "The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church." But what if the martyrdom of our age isn't primarily about shedding blood but about the slow, daily dying to self in a thousand small ways? What if our colosseum is the comment section, our lions are the algorithms, and our witness is simply refusing to hate our enemies?

 

The Universal Call to Sainthood

Here's what makes this prophecy not terrifying but thrilling: God doesn't call just a select few to sainthood. He calls all of us. The Second Vatican Council's document Lumen Gentium speaks of the "universal call to holiness," but this truth echoes throughout Scripture. Jesus said, "You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect" (Matthew 5:48, ESV). This isn't a suggestion for the spiritually elite—it's a command for every disciple.

The saints we venerate and I quote in my e-mails to you—Augustine, Francis, Teresa, Thérèse—weren't born saints. Augustine spent his youth in sexual immorality and heretical philosophy. Francis was a wealthy playboy. Teresa of Ávila admitted she wasted nearly twenty years in mediocre spirituality. Thérèse of Lisieux struggled with doubt and darkness. They became saints not through their own strength but through persistent cooperation with grace.

And here's the secret: God wants to make you a saint even more than you want to become one. As C.S. Lewis wrote in Mere Christianity, "The command Be ye perfect is not idealistic gas. Nor is it a command to do the impossible. He is going to make us into creatures that can obey that command."

 

The Prayer That God Always Answers

There's a prayer that God will always answer because it's always in accordance with His will: "Lord, make me a saint." First Thessalonians 4:3 tells us explicitly, "For this is the will of God, your sanctification" (ESV). The Greek word for sanctification (hagiasmos), shares its root with the word for saint (hagios). God's will is literally to make you holy, set apart, a saint.

I pray almost every day that God would make me a saint. It's not a prayer offered in vanity (though it can be, if you're praying it for the wrong reasons, for personal vainglory), but a simple prayer that God would make me the man he had in mind when He created me. And here's the good news. We always pray "thy will be done," but God has already revealed that making you a saint is His will. It's a prayer He'll always answer with, "yes," but it's not a prayer he usually answers with a zap from heavenly light.

It's a prayer he answer but providing you the opportunities and challenges in life necessary to forge you into the person He created you to be.

Are we willing to endure what we must for Him to answer this prayer? Are we willing to persist against all odds? Are we willing to cooperate with the grace He gives us?

The Spanish mystic John of the Cross wrote about the "dark night of the soul," those periods where God seems absent, prayer feels empty, and faith becomes difficult. In our age, we might experience this dark night not in a monastery but in a supermarket or in a hostile work environment. Not in extended contemplation but in the exhaustion of raising children. Not in dramatic mystical experiences but in the mundane struggle to forgive a spouse, again (and in this respect, I have little doubt that God will make my wife into a saint!)

 

Practical Steps for Would-Be Saints

So how do we cooperate with grace in our quest for sainthood? Here are some practical strategies:

Start small, but start today. Choose one tiny act of faithfulness—saying grace before one meal, praying for one minute, reading one verse of Scripture. The Desert Fathers taught that small, consistent practices build spiritual strength more effectively than sporadic heroic efforts. Consistency is the stone that paves the road toward sainthood.

Embrace the suffering specific to your state in life. A parent's path to holiness is found in the relentless, exhausting self-gift of raising children. A student's is found in the discipline of study and resisting the pull of distraction. A coworker's is found in patient, charitable service. Don't search for heroic suffering; accept the mundane suffering that is already present in your daily duties.

Create a 'Digital Desert' for one hour. Intentionally block out a non-negotiable hour each day—perhaps the first or last hour—where all screens are off, and you dedicate that time to silence, prayer, reading Scripture, or deep connection with a family member. This is your personal moment to "hold your place" against the world's noise.

Practice the 'Examen' at the end of the day. This Ignatian practice involves reviewing your day not to beat yourself up, but to find God's presence.

 - Acknowledge: What were you most grateful for today (the "bread with thanksgiving")?

 - Identify: Where did you struggle most (where you failed to "hold your place")?

 - Resolve: Ask for God's grace and make a single, practical resolve for tomorrow. This turns failure into a lesson and fosters persistence.

The Desert Fathers saw the future, and they saw you. They knew that your quiet, seemingly insignificant acts of fidelity would be among the most challenging and therefore the most glorious in the history of the Church. You don't need to flee to the wilderness to find God or battle the ancient foes. You only need to hold your ground, give thanks for your bread, and endure the next hour with grace.

Your ordinary struggle is, in God's eyes, an extraordinary battle. Will you stand firm?