Catholic Thought discussion

We are reaching the climactic chapter of St. Augustine’s final conversion. These last steps are agonizing for him and for us readers. The path God has chosen for him is no ordinary path, for it is the total submission to a celibate vocation thereby opening the way to the priesthood. In these pages Augustine has more than once professed to be a man full of earthy passions, and to leave these human joys behind for the sole love of God is a hard struggle.

“(1) What I now longed for was not greater certainty about you, but a more steadfast abiding in you. In my daily life everything seemed to be teetering, and my heart needed to be cleansed of the old leaven. I was attracted to the Way, which is our Savior himself, but the narrowness of the path daunted me and I still could not walk in it.”

He wants to cling to what is known and fears the unknown. His powerful words speak pointedly to us as we all have stood on a precipice before making a crucial decision. Yet God pulls him relentlessly.

In paragraph four we come to an often quoted line spoken by Victorinus, “It’s the walls that make Christians, then?” The notes in my edition elaborate:

”…to be a true Christian, one has to get to the gathering Body of Christ and to the sacraments. Christianity is not a religion of abstract spirit but particular and incarnate Truth. The walls in fact, do make a difference.”

This reinforces that without the sacraments, you really don’t have a Church, but only spiritual abstractions. It is the sacraments that graft us to the Body of Christ, his Church.

In these struggles he comes to the conclusion that earthly pleasures are always paired with some kind of discomfort or pain.

“(7) Even the natural pleasures of human life are attained through distress, not only through the unexpected calamities that befall against our will but also through deliberate and planned discomfort. There is no pleasure in eating and drinking unless the discomfort of hunger and thirst have proceeded them. […] (8) In every case greater sorrow issues in greater joy. How can this be, O Lord my God, when you are yourself your own eternal joy, and all around you heaven rejoices in you eternally? ”

Augustine realizes that only God can provide pure unencumbered joy, and he is powerfully drawn to it.

“(10) The truth is that disordered lust springs from a perverted will; when lust is pandered to, a habit is formed; when habit is not checked, it hardens into compulsion. […] And so the two wills fought it out – the old and the new, the one carnal, the other spiritual – and in their struggle tore my soul apart.”

The final scene in this conversion drama takes place in a garden his friend Alypius keeping watch over him.

”(22) I was at odds with myself, and fragmenting myself. This disintegration was occurring without my consent, but what it indicated was not the presence in me of a mind belonging to some alien nature but the punishment undergone by my own. In this sense, and this sense only, it was not I who brought it about, but the sin that dwelt within me as penalty for that other sin committed with greater freedom; for I was a son of Adam.

(25) I shrank from dying to death and living to life, for ingrained evil was more powerful in me than new-grafted good. The nearer it came, that moment when I would be changed, the more it pierced me with terror. Dismayed, but not quite dislodged, I was left hanging.

(27) A revelation was coming to me from that country toward which I was facing, but into which I trembled to cross. … I saw that this same Continence was by no means sterile, but the fruitful mother of children conceived in joy from you, her Bridegroom. She was smiling at me, but with a challenging smile, as though to say, “Can you not do what these men have done, these women? Could any of them achieve it by their own strength, without the Lord their God? He it was, the Lord their God, who granted me to them. Why try to stand by yourself, only to lose your footing? Cast yourself on him and do not be afraid: he will not step back and let you fall. Cast yourself upon him trustfully; he will support and heal you.”

(29) Not in dissipation and drunkenness, nor in debauchery and lewdness, nor in arguing and jealousy; but put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh or the gratification of your desires. I had no wish to read further, nor was there need. No sooner had I reached the end of the verse than the light of certainty flooded my heart and all dark shades of doubt fled away.

(30) We went indoors and told my mother, who was overjoyed.”

"It is the sacraments that graft us to the Body of Christ, his Church. "

Well said Kerstin I like that. I loved chapter 8. I don't have time to really say anything about it now, but I will as I get my thoughts together and have a little more time.

You summarized St. Augustine’s hard battle very well Kerstin. Second reading of this book surprised me in the struggle St. Augustine went through to come to the deciding moment. I remember mostly the impressive scene of conversion but the spiritual wrestling that he describes in the first three quarters of this book was something that I paid less attention to on first reading.

Thank you Galicius :)
In these conversion struggles St. Augustine reminds me of Scott Hahn. When I read Rome Sweet Home: Our Journey to Catholicism the intense and relentless questioning and probing took my breath away. And here I am a convert myself!

Augustine is so systematic in how he questions and tries to find answers. It really is beautiful how his understanding was widened bit by bit, how Truth took a deeper and deeper hold on him.

Here’s a helpful picture that gives the timeline of St. Augustine:

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-DGaEGNYR_K0...

Thank you, Kennet, for the timeline. It helped me to remember the years all this took place. My memory isn't what it used to be.

What struck me was just how physical this conversion was for him, and how blessed he was to have a friend watch over him as he went through this. A blessing Jesus didn't have in the garden. It hit home the love God has for us that he would give us people in our lives that would be willing to be there during our most vulnerable.

I was also struck by his relationship with his mother. I have three sons, so I find myself fascinated with his thoughts about her and her impact upon him.

Talea wrote: "What struck me was just how physical this conversion was for him, and how blessed he was to have a friend watch over him as he went through this. A blessing Jesus didn't have in the garden."

Wow! that's a great observation! I completely missed the parallel setting to Gethsemane.

Talea wrote: "I was also struck by his relationship with his mother. I have three sons, so I find myself fascinated with his thoughts about her and her impact upon him. "

We've been thinking along the same lines :)
I have two grown sons, and I was thinking how would they describe me? What would they emphasize?

Keratin, two of my sons are adults now and they struggle with many of the same issues St. Augustine did. It gives me hope. One is highly intellectual and in prelaw, the other is a drop out working on his GED and working minimum wage to help his younger siblings and I. He is just as intelligent, but more of the street variety I'm afraid.as he hated schooling of any kind. My younger son is special needs and I have a young daughter who adores them all. Reading about Augustine and his mother is what my soul needed right now.