THE YEAR of VOLUME X . ISSUE I CONSECRATED LIFE ORIGINS OF THE ORDER THE AUGUSTINIAN

SAINT AUGUSTINE p. 3

CALL TO ORDER p. 12 354 A.D. 372–373 A.D. C AURELIUS AUGUSTINE IS BORN IN , NORTH WHILE IN , AUGUSTINE BECOMES AN H (NOW IN ) TO MONICA, A ADHERENT OF THE MANICHAEAN RELIGIOUS CATHOLIC AND PATRICIUS, A PAGAN WHO IS A ROMAN MOVEMENT INSPIRED BY REVELATIONS R OFFICIAL (CURIALIS OF THAGASTE). AUGUSTINE HAS RECEIVED BY A MAN WHO CALLED HIMSELF O A BROTHER NAVIGIUS AND A SISTER, WHOSE NAME IS MANI. BORN IN 216 A.D. IN BABYLONIA, MANI UNRECORDED. THAGASTE, SITUATED IN THE NORTH-EAST WAS EXECUTED FOR HIS RELIGIOUS BELIEFS BY N HIGHLANDS OF , HELD NATURAL HABITATS FOR BAHRAM I, IN 277 A.D. SAINT AUGUSTINE LIONS AND PANTHERS, CAPTURED AND SOLD FOR ROMAN O L AMPHITHEATER GAMES. 373 A.D. FROM DOUBT TO CERTITUDE AUGUSTINE RETURNS TO THAGASTE O 359 A.D. TO TEACH RHETORIC. G AUGUSTINE ATTENDS ELEMENTARY SCHOOL IN THAGASTE (NOW SOUK AHRAS) AND HIGH SCHOOL IN MADAURA (NOW 376 A.D. Y M’DAOUROUCH, ALGERIA), 15 MILES SOUTH OF THAGASTE. AUGUSTINE RETURNS TO CARTHAGE TO TEACH RHETORIC. 354–359 A.D. 372–376 A.D.

370–372 A.D. 370–371 A.D. AUGUSTINE RETURNS TO THAGASTE FOR A YEAR, AS HIS PARENTS ATTEMPT TO GAIN THE MEANS TO FURTHER HIS EDUCATION. HIS FATHER, WHO HAS CONVERTED TO CHRISTIANITY, DIES UNEXPECTEDLY. A WEALTHY LANDOWNER HELPS THE FAMILY SEND AUGUSTINE TO CARTHAGE FOR FURTHER STUDIES.

371–372 A.D. AS MARRIAGE BETWEEN CLASSES IS STRICTLY REGULATED BY ROMAN LAW, AUGUSTINE, A ROMAN CITIZEN, ENTERS INTO A MONOGAMOUS CONCUBINAGE RELATIONSHIP WITH A WOMAN OF A LOWER CLASS STATUS. A SON, ADEODATUS, IS BORN IN CARTHAGE TO AUGUSTINE AND HIS PARTNER.

by George P. Lawless, O.S.A. Sixteen centuries ago, during the Easter While he deplored their destruction of A public lecture delivered by Father Vigil, 24-25 April 387, a thirty-three year property, still he enjoyed their company in Lawless at Villanova University on old Roman from the province of Numidia much the same way that he reveled in the company of other adolescent friends, when November 29, 2011. in North Africa was baptized by Ambrose, bishop of Milan in the north of Italy. That together they heedlessly stole pears from an decision to seek baptism together with his orchard in an incident made famous from son, Adeodatus, and his friend Alypius, was his Confessions. Augustine was no different to have incalculable consequences for the from other boys from school, and he had Christian Churches and for all of western an intense dislike for the study of Greek. civilization. That convert to Catholic However, the fact that he went to high Christianity was Aurelius Augustine. school at all set him apart from many of Augustine was born November 13, his peers at Thagaste. 354, at Thagaste (now Souk Ahras) in When he completed high school at modern Algeria. Situated some sixty miles fifteen years of age, Augustine returned inland from the Mediterranean Sea on home. As he was preparing to leave one of three overland routes connecting for advanced studies in philosophy and the seacoast of Hippo (Modern ) rhetoric at the end of the year, his father and Carthage, the backwater town of died. Patrick, the father of Augustine, was Thagaste featured little more than a hotel a man who lived all his life as a pagan and for travelers. With only an elementary was converted to Christianity only shortly school available to him in his hometown, before his death. This significant loss Augustine, a serious but by no means happened at the very time that Augustine exceptional student, attended high school was experiencing a year of youthful idleness at Madaura some twenty miles distant from while his parents were scraping together Thagaste. enough money to advance still further As a teenager, he associated with a group their son’s education. Now widowed and of teenagers who were called “Wreckers.” with three children, Monica the mother

4 . THE AUGUSTINIAN . SPRING/SUMMER 2015 THE AUGUSTINIAN . SPRING/SUMMER 2015 . 5 384 A.D. (FALL) AUGUSTINE IS APPOINTED OFFICIAL ORATOR IN MILAN.

385 A.D. MONICA JOINS AUGUSTINE IN MILAN. AUGUSTINE VISITS THE BISHOP OF MILAN, AMBROSE, AND ATTENDS SUNDAY WORSHIP TO HEAR THE FAMED PREACHER. 387 A.D. AUGUSTINE, HIS SON ADEODATUS AND HIS 386 A.D. FRIEND ALYPIUS ARE BAPTIZED ON APRIL 24 MONICA ARRANGES A LEGALLY AND SOCIABLY SUITABLE ON THE EVE OF EASTER IN MILAN BY BISHOP MARRIAGE FOR HER SON. AUGUSTINE’S PARTNER, THE AMBROSE IN THE CATHEDRAL OF MILAN. MOTHER OF ADEODATUS, RETURNS TO NORTH AFRICA ALONE. ADEODATUS REMAINS WITH HIS FATHER. 384–386 A.D. 387 A.D.

383–384 A.D. 386 A.D. 387 A.D.

383-384 A.D. 386 A.D. 387 A.D. AUGUSTINE, WITH FAMILY AND FRIENDS, SETS SAIL AUGUSTINE HAS A GREAT MOMENT OF AUGUSTINE LEAVES MILAN AND GOES TO THE PORT OF TO ROME WHERE HE WILL TEACH, KNOWINGLY LEAVING CONVERSION TO CHRISTIANITY IN THE OSTIA TO RETURN TO NORTH AFRICA, BUT IS DELAYED HIS MOTHER BEHIND PRAYING IN A CHAPEL. MONICA GARDEN OF HIS RESIDENCE IN MILAN. FOR ALMOST TWO YEARS WHILE THE PORT IS CLOSED BY RETURNS TO THAGASTE. A BLOCKADE. DURING THIS TIME, AUGUSTINE AND MONICA EXPERIENCE A COMMON MYSTICAL MOMENT WHEN THEY TALK ABOUT DIVINE WISDOM. DESCRIBING THE MOMENT AUGUSTINE SAID: “WE DID FOR ONE INSTANT TOUCH IT...” (CONFESSIONS 9.10.23-25).

of Augustine, was singularly fortunate to Near the end of his pursuit of philosophy read The Categories of Aristotle, a book on A YOUNG URBAN PROFESSIONAL the sake of savoring the eloquence of the that crucial link with the interior realm of have the help of a wealthy landowner and and rhetoric at Carthage, Augustine logic which helped shape the orderliness famous preacher. Although first attracted Dissatisfied with the failure of Faustus the spiritual and the immaterial. resident of Thagaste who was willing to joined an oriental religious sect called of his mind. There followed a gradual by Ambrose’s delivery of the gospel, it was to make a strong case for Manichaeism, Monica, meanwhile, had joined her son provide the necessary financial support for Manichaesim, to which he gave his disenchantment with the Manichaen not long before Augustine showed interest Augustine shortly thereafter despaired of shortly after his arrival in Milan. With her his education at Carthage, a city some 170 allegiance for at least the next nine years religion, but its ardent devotees prevailed in the gospel of delivery. He became less finding the truth. He became a skeptic. intrusive manner she apparently wasted miles away from home. of his young life. upon their co-religionist to persevere. critical of the Bible with its confusing Augustine started teaching again and soon no time arranging a suitable marriage for Ancient Carthage was notorious as When Augustine returned to his Their most distinguished teacher, Faustus, contents and its inelegant style. Gradually discovered that Roman students refused to her son. As a result, Augustine’s unnamed a sizzling frying-pan for illicit loves, birthplace after the completion of advanced they promised, would eventually come he became open to receive its message. pay tuition and fees. Eventually, through mother of Adeodatus was summarily so much so that the Latin word play studies, his mother barred him from the to Carthage and respond to Augustine’s At the same time, through his interest the influence of Symmachus, the Prefect of dismissed and returned to North Africa. Carthago, Carthage, and sartago cauldron, in house. Monica made more strenuous many questions. Faustus finally came, but in philosophy, he attached himself to an Rome, his own merits as a teacher and the Augustine withheld her name from Augustine’s Confessions prompted T.S. Eliot’s objection to her son’s adherence to his torrent of words was all fantasy and established circle of people who were important fact that he was not a Catholic posterity, undoubtedly out of personal poetic version of this youthful adventure: Manichaeism than to his cohabitation fable. Augustine’s disillusionment increased. conversant with the Christian religion and Christian, Augustine secured for himself respect for her, but also for the obvious “To Carthage I came, burning, burning, with a woman. With his proselytizing To make matters worse, the students Greek Philosophers, notably Plato, Plotinus the prestigious post of Public Orator at reason that his Confessions were widely burning, burning.” Paganism had, indeed, temperament, Augustine had already made at Carthage proved to be reckless and and Porphyry. Milan. This ambitious young man from circulated during his lifetime as Bishop of been a powerful force at Madaura where converts to the Manichaean religion and disorderly with the result that Augustine’s The story of the conversion to a middle-class provincial family in far-off Hippo. From the beginning, both parties Augustine spent his high school years and told even his staunchly Christian mother level of job satisfaction as a teacher was Christianity of Marius Victorinus had a Africa had now become an upper-class were aware that their liaison was destined again at Carthage where he continued his that some day she too would become a pitifully low. Putting all these considerations profound effect upon Augustine because urban professional who would surely catch to be ephemeral. This is why “mistress” is formal education. Manichee. After having opened a school, together, Augustine determined to seek he was, like himself, a noted and respected the eye of the Imperial Court. conceivably an ill-suited word for depicting Having become the father of a son born Augustine found the environs of his native new horizons. It was only the cruel trick rhetorician. Indeed his first-hand account Milan was a highly cosmopolitan city. Augustine’s lover, his companion for more out of wedlock at seventeen years of age, Thagaste too confining for his present of deliberately deceiving his mother and with many people of keen mind, for whom Its sophisticated residents made fun of than a decade, and the mother of their son. Augustine now settled into cohabitation ambitions. Even more distressing to him was leaving her praying for him patiently in a faith and reason were certainly compatible, Augustine with his rustic North African There is no doubt in my mind that, in the with the mother of his son Adeodatus, a the unexpected death of an intimate young local chapel that enabled Augustine to sail slowly convinced Augustine that Catholic accent. Not long after his arrival, Augustine long run, many years of living with this name which means “gift of God.” When friend; Augustine was disconsolate. Both of for Rome with his partner and their son. Christianity was, after all, intellectually visited the urbane and learned bishop woman gave rise to some of Augustine’s Augustine was eighteen years of age, these circumstances in his life prompted him Monica went home alone. Augustine tells respectable. In the meantime, some of the of Milan, Ambrose, but the encounter mature and enlightened reflections on love he read Hortensius by Cicero which he to leave his hometown rather hurriedly. us: “I went to Rome.” writings of the Platonists put him in touch had the nature of a courtesy call. More and friendship, trust, human affectivity and afterwards described as a book that “altered Augustine returned to Carthage. There with what was deepest in himself, his own importantly, the meeting prompted fidelity in marriage. my outlook on life” (Confessions, 3,4,7). at little more than twenty years of age, he ability to conceive of the “world within,” Augustine to attend Sunday worship for

6 . THE AUGUSTINIAN . SPRING/SUMMER 2015 THE AUGUSTINIAN . SPRING/SUMMER 2015 . 7 388 A.D. AUGUSTINE SAILS TO NORTH AFRICA AND GOES TO THAGASTE WHERE HE FOUNDS A LAY COMMUNITY.

389 A.D. ADEODATUS, SON OF AUGUSTINE, DIES IN THAGASTE. 397 A.D. AUGUSTINE WRITES THE RULE AT THE REQUEST 391 A.D. OF MONKS IN THE HIPPO MONASTERY WHEN AUGUSTINE IS ORDAINED A PRIEST IN HIPPO. BELOW ARE HE MOVES FROM THERE TO THE BISHOP’S THE EXCAVATIONS OF PACIS, IN HIPPO, WHERE HOUSE. THE RULE WAS ALSO ADAPTED FOR AUGUSTINE EXERCISED HIS MINISTRIES. MONASTERIES OF WOMEN. 388–391 A.D. 397 A.D.

387 A.D. 395–397 A.D.

387 A.D. 395–397 A.D. NINE DAYS LATER MONICA DIES AND IS BURIED IN AUGUSTINE SUCCEEDS VALERIUS OSTIA. IN 1430, MONICA’S BODY IS TAKEN TO THE AS BISHOP OF HIPPO AND FOUNDS BASILICA DI SANT’AGOSTINO IN ROME. A MONASTERY FOR CLERICS IN HIPPO. HE BEGINS WRITING THE CONFESSIONS.

Augustine then became formally engaged infidelity of this father. Also, he deeply He did what could not be predicted and Augustine was determined to marry. TWO STORIES OF CONVERSION service, and determined to follow Christ in to a young girl who was two years below loved both the woman and the boy. Her what could not be explained. He resigned In this matter, Monica was even more a life of poverty. So enthusiastic was their Two things happened that nudged the legal age for marriage. While he agreed callous dismissal can be explained partially his teaching position, and he did it as determined than he. In her mind, marriage conversion that they inspired their fiancées Augustine closer to the moment of to the terms of this legally and socially by the fact that the late Roman caste abruptly as Monica had dismissed the was the only possible way for her son to live to follow their example and to enter a conversion. The first was a simple story acceptable union, he took up with another system discouraged people of different mother of Adeodatus and sent her packing the Christian ideal. Augustine remained monastery for women. that provoked his thoughts. The second woman to satisfy his sexual needs. In a social status from marrying. There is in to North Africa. Except for some private unsettled about the question of marriage. The impact of this story forced was an experience so mysterious and so sensate culture which greatly resembled fact evidence to indicate that the Catholic tutoring, Augustine was out of work, having Although marriage might lead to wealth Augustine to reflect upon his own life, as he profound that Augustine himself found it our own, Augustine described himself as Church countenanced such an informal resigned his teaching position near the end and power, it did not promise to satisfy tells us in Confessions: “Pontician told us this difficult to describe in his Confessions some a man who was “hot for honors, money liaison. ([Council of Toledo (400 A.D.) of the school term. his desire for wisdom. Perhaps, instead, it story and as he spoke, you, O Lord, turned ten years later. and marriage” Canon 17]; What can we say about this might lead him astray. me back upon myself. You took me from The simple story of conversion came to (Confessions, 6, 6. 9). c.f. also Augustine, uncharacteristic behavior? Not much with On this very question, Augustine behind my own back where I had placed Augustine’s attention during the visit of Be that as it The Good Marriage, certainty, except to remark that Augustine engaged in earnest discussion with Alypius, myself because I did not wish to look upon “It is better to be a cripple another North African named Pontician, may, we ought 5,5.) Neither appeared to be on the verge of a total his life-long friend. For those serious in the myself ” (8,7,16). who happened to notice that Augustine not to overstress Monica nor rearrangement of his life. Augustine also pursuit of wisdom, Alypius argues clearly The second episode is more difficult to limping along to God than owned a copy of the epistles of St. Paul. or exaggerate Augustine give manifested the symptoms of what we would and definitively in favor of the need for grasp. Here readers of the Confessions may This prompted Pontician to relate the the sinfulness of a champion athlete on the a good account today describe as a “nervous breakdown.” celibacy. Augustine was not so sure. At any wish that its author had been less artistic in story of two public officials who had Augustine’s youth of themselves in The facts of his life make it clear that rate, Augustine’s journey toward wisdom, the telling. Some scholars actually dismiss found themselves in a dilemma much like and middle years. wrong track.” the preemptory the allurement of wealth and power, the begun with the reading of Cicero, had the event as though it were a literary that of Augustine. Young and ambitious Very likely the dismissal of possible governorship of a Roman province met with disappointment in the Bible, had fiction. Augustine heard the voice, “as (Sermon 168.15) and engaged to be married, they were stable relationship Augustine’s partner. and prestige had lost their luster. Sex was been sidetracked with the Manachees and if ” he says, of a boy or girl chanting a in steady pursuit of those pleasures that which he cultivated It was a period the last stronghold to imprison Augustine seemed to be far from having reached its repetitious refrain: “Pick it up and read, the world offered to them. Yet these two with the unnamed woman whom he loved of strain both financially and professionally. as his erotic needs held out until the final end in the dry abstractions of philosophy. pick it up and read.” (Confessions 8,12,29). government employees were so deeply contrasted significantly with other liaisons While Augustine had friends in high places stage of his conversion. The raging desires This ever-burning desire for wisdom was Obediently he hurries to the spot in the affected by the invitation of Matthew’s with little or no permanence. By remaining and they were good to him, the hard fact inside him were surely reflected in his not, apparently, sufficient explanation for garden where Alypius was sitting. There he gospel (19:21) to sell all and give to the faithful to this woman for upwards of remained: he needed money and he needed prayer: “Grant me chastity and self-control, the dramatic turn of events in his life. snatched the epistles of Saint Paul, opened poor that they abandoned their possessions, thirteen years, Augustine’s behavior a wife who had some. What then did but please not yet” (Confessions, 8, 7, 17). the volume and read the first text that met gave up their careers in the imperial contrasted sharply with the marital Augustine do next? his eyes. It was Romans 13: 13-14. “No

8 . THE AUGUSTINIAN . SPRING/SUMMER 2015 THE AUGUSTINIAN . SPRING/SUMMER 2015 . 9 412 A.D. AUGUSTINE BEGINS WRITING CITY OF GOD.

413 A.D. 430 A.D. THE FIRST CHAPTERS OF CITY OF GOD ARE PUBLISHED. AUGUST 28, DEATH AND BURIAL OF AUGUSTINE.

412-413 A.D. 430 A.D.

397–411 A.D. 426 A.D. 720–1337 A.D.

397 A.D. 426 A.D. 720 A.D. PREACHES AT CARTHAGE DURING THE SUMMER AND PARTICIPATES IN AUGUSTINE LEAVES HIPPO IN THE WINTER THE YEAR THOUGHT TO BE WHEN THE THE COUNCILS OF CARTHAGE. FOR HIS HEALTH; BEGINS RETRACTATIONES. REMAINS OF AUGUSTINE ARE PLACED IN THE CRYPT OF THE CHURCH OF SAN 411 A.D. PIETRO IN CIEL D’ORO, (SAINT PETER OF THE PARTICIPATES IN COLLATIO OF 411, A CONFERENCE SET TO RESOLVE GOLDEN CEILING), IN PAVIA, ITALY. THE INTENSE CONFLICT BETWEEN THE DONATISTS AND THE CATHOLICS. AUGUSTINE HAD LONG BEEN AGAINST THE DONATISTS, 1337 A.D. WHO CONSIDERED SACRAMENTS PERFORMED BY PRIESTS WHO ON JANUARY 30, 1327, POPE JOHN XXII, BETRAYED THE CHURCH DURING TIMES OF ROMAN PERSECUTION GRANTS THE ORDER OF SAINT AUGUSTINE NULL OR INVALID. AUGUSTINE OPPOSED THE MOVEMENT, BELIEVING A HOUSE ALONGSIDE AUGUSTINE’S TOMB SACRAMENTS WERE INSTITUTED BY CHRIST, NOT MAN. THIS AFFIRMING ORDER’S SPECIAL BOND WITH CONFERENCE WAS RESOLVED IN FAVOR OF THE CATHOLICS. ITS SPIRITUAL HEAD.

reveling or drunkenness, no debauchery God alone endows the human soul with longer confused him. By urging him to read and a self-centered psychologism were Augustine exclaimed, “I have become an (Confessions, 3, 6, 11)—“All the while I was or vice, no quarrels or jealousies! Rather some remarkable powers. He also came to the prophet Isaiah, Ambrose unlocked the indeed all the wrong tracks. enigma to myself ” (Confessions, 10, 33, 50). outside, you were inside” (Confessions, put on the Lord Jesus Christ and make no realize that the Manichees made a mockery riches of the Old Testament and Augustine, It had been no easy path for Augustine Turning within himself and being intent 10, 27, 38). provision for the desires of the flesh.” This of human freedom for the first time, to travel from doubt to certitude, from solely upon himself, he had found nothing Augustine never thought of himself as is a powerful message for any reader of the by insisting that could grasp the ignorance about God to his burning but doubt and confusion. This sense of a saint; that we should regard him as a Bible. It gets right to the heart of Christian all human activity The more he examined the legitimacy of desire to possess God. But all along the emptiness inside led Augustine to cry out saint would indeed surprise him. When life. Why did it come to Augustine at this was the net result puzzle and the more he searched referring to God as way he found that every doubt contains for God and for himself: “But where was surrendered to God, his love for eloquence time? How did it affect him? Augustine of mechanical the riddle that was himself, the “mother,” “nurse,” some certitude. The one who doubts is at I when I looked for you?...I could not loosened his tongue in praise of God. shares this great moment of conversion forces warring “a mother-bird with least certain of being alive and doubting. find myself, much less you” (Confessions, When surrendered to God, his intellectual with us in his Confessions: against each other. more he felt a presence of God her fledglings.” For Without mystery, reason and intelligence 5,2,2). Acceptance of mystery in human sharpness earned him greater eloquence I had no wish to read further, and no need. His persistent who was within him—“Yet all the Augustine, to apply offer no exit. The mystery of faith in God existence gave Augustine his first solid step and the understanding of profundities. For in that instant with the very ending of fascination with time you were more inward than human qualities and the actuality of human freedom offer in this understanding of God. The more When surrendered to God, his unquiet and the sentence, it was as though a light of utter astrology finally to God, whether exits everywhere. Psychology that bends us he examined the puzzle and the more restless heart became quiet and found rest confidence shone in all my heart and the succumbed to the my inmost self...” (Confessions, masculine or back solely upon ourselves soon becomes he searched the riddle that was himself, in the silent mysterious presence of God darkness of uncertainty vanished. For you conviction that 3, 6, 11)—“All the while I feminine, had been, mired in the pool of Narcissus. Religious the more he felt a presence of God who that was always deep inside him. had converted me to yourself, so I would seek the fault lies not was outside, you were inside” in an earlier day, faith that turns us towards God gives us the was within him—“Yet all the time you not ambition in this world (8, 12, 29-30). in our stars, but rank heresy. freedom of full, human life. This is how were more inward than my inmost self...” (Translation John J. O’Meara). inside ourselves. (Confessions, 10, 27, 38). Augustine will Augustine grew in his understanding of His distaste for later observe: God and the mystery of human iniquity. EVERY DOUBT CONTAINS the Bible was “It is better to be “I created a human being, not avarice; diminishing, thanks to the preaching a cripple limping along to God than a I created a human being, not highway SOME CERTITUDE of Ambrose, which presented new and champion athlete on the wrong track” robbery; I created a human being, not George P. Lawless, O.S.A., is an international By this time Neoplatonic philosophy challenging insights into the meaning of (Sermon 169.15). At this stage of his life, marital infidelity” (Homily 3,9 On the First had laid the axe forever to the roots of scholar and interpreter of the writings of God’s words. The conflicting genealogies of he had travelled far enough along the Letter of John). Augustine. Author of and Augustine’s materialism by instructing him Jesus as they were recorded into the gospels road of this restless journey to discover When he searched within himself to that God exists beyond matter and that His Monastic Rule, Father George received his and so often ridiculed by the Manichees no that materialism, skepticism, rationalism assess the condition of his own soul, doctorate from the Angelicum, Rome.

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