The Lenten fast is often neglected or misunderstood. But this season offers the time and place to make us freer and stronger.   There’s a reason why fasting sounds exhausting. There’s a reason why people feel uncomfortable just envisioning a forty-day stretch of abstaining from certain foods or activities. The Lenten season is, after all, a long and tiring period for its participants. It’s hard. That becomes clear in the last days of Lent—the days

Part 1:  Heroes Feast of Saint Andrew Today, November 30th, is the feast day of Saint Andrew the Apostle on both the Eastern and Western calendars.  East and West don’t share all saints, and many of the saints that we do mutually venerate are not honored on the same calendar day.  Andrew is in the privileged minority of saints that are honored both simultaneously and universally.  (Don’t even make me go into the old calendar/new