ST.

FRANCIS PAROCHIAL SCHOOL

Talisay, Camarines Norte

MODULE IN GR. 12
AUGUSTINIAN SPIRITUALITY
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Topic : Lesson 5 - St. Augustine Search for Truth

I. Introduction:

Augustine claimed that without the will, “man cannot live rightly.” He affirms in yet
another place, “We could not act rightly except by this free choice of will.” The logic here
is simple: man cannot choose the good without having the ability to choose.

II. Competency/ies:

Guide them to have their own perspective and understanding of the lessons.

III. Specific Objectives:

● To have a broad mind and understanding of what God wants to show us from
the teachings of St. Augustine
● To think critically to the story of the life of St. Augustine.
● To appropriate the insights learned from St. Augustine into one’s own Christian
Life.

IV. Pre assessment:

Cartoon Analysis: Make a different Augustinian cartoon pictures showing Deep

Search for Truth and Compassion and put a quote from St.
Augustine that fits to your cartoon pictures.

V. Lesson Inputs: Week 5

● Augustine:

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 Monastic life of Saint Augustine
In 388, Augustine returned from Milan to his home in Thagaste. He then sold his
patrimony and gave the money to the poor. The only thing he kept was the family house,
which he converted into a monastic foundation for himself and a group of friends with
whom he shared a life of prayer.

In 388, Augustine returned from Milan to his home in Thagaste. He then sold his patrimony
and gave the money to the poor. The only thing he kept was the family house, which he
converted into a monastic foundation for himself and a group of friends with whom he
shared a life of prayer. Later as bishop he invited his priests to share a community life with
him.
Augustine followed the monastic or religious life as it was known to his contemporaries,
drafting rules for the monks and nuns of Roman Africa. Like St. Basil, Augustine's view
diverged from that of the earlier eremitical approach of strict physical austerities. In The
Ways of the Catholic Church, Augustine observed contemporary criticisms of the methods of
the Eastern hermits in the Egyptian desert. It was said that their extreme isolation and
excessive asceticism "were no longer productive" for the church or society. In response to
this, "Augustine promoted poverty of spirit and continence of the heart while living in the
milieu of a town such as Hippo."
In Hippo, the members of his monastic house lived in community while yet keeping to their
pastoral obligations. For Augustine, 'the love of neighbor was simply another expression of
the love of God." He saw the call to service in the church a necessity to be heeded, even if it
compromised a personal desire for contemplation and study. One of the elements of
communal living was simplicity of lifestyle. Regarding the use of property or possessions,
Augustine did not make a virtue of poverty, but of sharing. Augustine wrote frequently on
prayer, but proscribed no specific method, system, or posture; although he highly endorsed
the psalms.
Several of his friends and disciples elevated to the episcopacy imitated his example, among
them Alypius at Tagaste, Possidiusat Calama, Profuturus and Fortunatus
at Cirta, Evodius at Uzalis, and Boniface at Carthage.

● Augustine: The Priest / Bishop

Priest

A visit to Hippo unexpectedly led Augustine to priesthood.

When Augustine visited Hippo from Thagaste in the year 389, it
resulted in the unintended outcome of propelling him to priesthood.
While in his lay community at Thagaste in the year 389, Augustine
went to Hippo to see a friend who was interested in setting up a
similar community there. Thirty-five years later, he recounted in
Sermon 355 how greatly this visit changed his life. In Hippo "I was
grabbed," he explained. Augustine was not exaggerating; he was
pressed into becoming a priest.

Before becoming a bishop. Augustine had five years of priesthood (391-396). He began this
ministry not later than the Easter of 391, when he preached to the candidates for baptism in
Hippo. Valerius had insisted that he preach, in spite of the custom in Africa of reserving that
ministry to bishops. These years as a priest were quite a formative time for him. As a priest,

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 Augustine devoted himself to the study of Scripture in a
different way than before, and even successfully
sought otium ("study leave") from Bishop Valerius of
Hippo in order to do so. He prepared himself for the
years ahead. There would be struggles with heretics and
a huge amount of writing that he would undertake.
During this period he wrote the first of his treatises
against the Manicheans. The dialogues that Augustine
wrote at Cassiciacum the year following his conversion
and preceding his baptism showed few substantial signs
of a theological understanding that was decisively or
distinctively Christian.

By the time of his ordination to the presbyterate, however, the basic lines of a
comprehensive and orthodox theology within him were firmly laid out. Augustine neglected
to write about what had happened in his thought between 385 and 391. He had other
questions, more interesting to him, with which to wrestle. While he was a priest Augustine
combated heresy, especially Manichæism, which in earlier years he himself had followed.
Partly because of this past experience with it, his success against Manichaeism was notable.
Fortunatus, one of their scholars and a Manichean priest at Hippo, whom Augustine debated
in a public conference in 392, was so humiliated by his defeat that he fled from Hippo. Other
details of this period are that Augustine appealed to Aurelius, Bishop of Carthage, to
suppress the custom of holding banquets and entertainments in the churches. By the year
395 Augustine had succeeded, through his courageous words, in abolishing this custom in
Hippo.

As well, his treatise De fide et symboli ("About Faith and symbols") was prepared to be read
before the bishops of the region assembled at the Council held at Hippo on 8 October 393.
After that he travelled to Carthage, which was to become the most frequent destination of
all of his subsequent journeys. Augustine remained there for a while, perhaps in connection
with the synod held there in 394. In summary, the times which Augustine spent in the
presbyterate (391-396) were the last years of his formative period. His earliest written
works from the year 396 onwards reveal the fully developed Christian thinker of whose
special teaching we think when we speak of Augustinianism. This demonstrates that his five
years of priesthood had been, therefore, an important time of intellectual growth for him. As
a very new priest, Augustine placed before Valerius, his bishop, a respectful demand.
Augustine thought that Valerius had almost no choice when responding; the only realistic
answer to the letter from Augustine was that his request be granted. Valerius knew that
Augustine had been "grabbed" for priesthood - as Augustine himself had described it - by
the Hippo congregation, even possibly with the connivance of Valerius himself; this
unexpected and muscular persuasion had caught Augustine not only by surprise but also
unprepared

Augustine had suddenly been transferred from his dedicated lay membership in the
church to the sacrament and ministry of priesthood. He did this without moving
gradually through any of the intermediate clerical grades such as lector, sub
deacon, or deacon. he may have been concerned that others would not have
approved his rapid promotion through these grades of Holy Orders. Even if that

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were not so, Augustine himself in any case was clearly aware
of the inadequacy of his hurried preparation for his ministry.
This would have been especially true of the role of preaching
into which Bishop Valerius promoted Augustine while he was
still a priest and not yet a bishop. For a priest to preach was
quite exceptional in the church in North Africa until Augustine
broke that pattern. From what is known of his style of
preaching, Augustine certainly sought further time for
the otium ("holy leisure") of absorbing the Scriptures.

Another motivation open to Augustine was that as a lay person

he had himself been a vocal critic of clergy who were
inadequately trained for duty. Now he suddenly he felt he was
in that situation himself. He now experienced the real dangers and actual demands
of priestly ministry, and as a result proposed a two-fold remedy to his bishop. The
first part was already happening: he had learned virtue by recognizing his
weakness (a task that his Confessions would show future ages soon after he
became a bishop). The second part of his remedy could only be addressed by an
intense study of the Scriptures, which in his letter to Valerius he called "the
medication of God." He wrote to Valerius, "I ought to carefully consider God's
medication in the Scriptures. I can do this by prayer and reading, in order that
strength sufficient for such dangerous obligations (as priesthood) may be granted
to me." (Letter 21,3) Studying the Gospel, praying them, and translating them into
deeds: this was the preparation that Augustine saw himself as needing. He thus
respectfully asked Valerius to grant him a period of time free of pastoral duty, a
request that apparently was granted.

With his talents and enthusiasm, Augustine was asked to be a Bishop

Valerius was the predecessor of Augustine as Bishop of Hippo. He saw Augustine as

his potential successor probably from the moment he first met him. He hurried the
appointment of Augustine as a bishop for the Church in Hippo for fear that he might
be called to fill a vacancy elsewhere. This fear of Valerius had some foundation,
because by now the high reputation of Augustine was known around Roman North
Africa. And so by careful scheming Valerius obtained privately the consent of Saint
Aurelius, who was Archbishop of Carthage and the Primate of North Africa, to make
Augustine his Coadjutor ("helper") Bishop.

For this step Valerius also won the approval of the local Catholic people, and the
agreement of the adjacent bishops in his province of Numidia. Having a coadjutor
(assistant) bishop was actually a violation of the eighth canon of the Council of
Nicea, which in its last clause forbade "two bishops in one city." Even so Valerius,
aged and dying persuaded his fellow bishops to grant his request.
Augustine himself had strenuously opposed becoming a bishop, as he correctly
sensed that it would draw him away even further from his desire to live in
community and have time for study of the Gospel. But he finally consented in the
year 395. A last-minute difficulty arose when Megalius of Caloama, the senior
bishop and primate of Numidia in which Hippo was located, announced that he

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could not make Augustine a bishop. Megalius had received information that
Augustine had given a woman a love potion, and had seduced her. It turned out
that the love potion was actually a eulogian, a blessed object. To his credit,
Megalius apologized to Augustine for his mistake and then went ahead with the
ceremony of ordination.

For Augustine, being a bishop was a charge to be accepted as manifestation of his

love for Christ. This love was to be humble (because he realized that the basis of
salvation was not in his being a bishop but in his being a Christian), disinterested
(because he must feed Christ's flock as Christ's, and not as his own, and because
he must promote God's glory and lordship, and not his own), and generous
(because it must be stronger than death).

Augustine was made a bishop in December 395 at the hands of Megalius, Primate
of Numidia, at the age of forty-two years. The aged and delighted Valerius
increasingly handed to Augustine more and more of his responsibilities at Hippo. As
a bishop in Hippo, a town in which he had not previously lived, Augustine began
with little influence in public life, and the schismatic leaders of the Donatists were
well established and influential there. It is known that, at first, he was kept waiting
when he visited the governor. Eventually, it was in his role as a magistrate and
arbiter of civil disputes that he first won people over.

Although a priest and bishop, he knew how to combine the practices of the religious
life with the many and varied duties of his office. His episcopal house in Hippo was
for himself and some of his clergy a monastery. He was fond of quoting Isaiah: "Do
not put your hopes in a human being." He never lost sight of the fact that neither
he nor any other person has ever been worthy of the grace of God. He avoided the
prestige which many of his brother bishops accepted as their due. In fact, he was
more weighed down by his sense of accountability than by any gifts and
possessions.

On an anniversary of his episcopal ordination, he once preached, "I am fearful of

what I am for you, but I draw strength from what I am with you. For you I am a
bishop, and with you I am a Christian. The former designates an office received, the
latter the foundation of salvation." At another anniversary of his episcopal
ordination, he preached, "Help me by your prayers and your obedience to carry out
these many serious and varied duties. Then I shall have the joy of not so much
ruling you as of being useful to you." (Sermon 350, 1)

In the office of bishop, he placed importance on being included in the prayers of his
people. In Letter 48, 1, he wrote, "We beg you to remember us in your prayers, for
we believe that you pray very alertly and attentively, whereas our own prayers are
weighted down and weakened by the darkness that secular involvement brings with
it. We are beset by so many problems that we can hardly breathe. And yet we are
sure that if we persevere in the ministry in which God has designed to place us
while promising his rewards, He in whose sight the groans of prisoners rise up will
set us free of every care through the help of your prayers."

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 He did not hesitate to reveal that the office of bishop was certainly not the first
choice he would have made for a lifestyle. In Sermon 339, he said, "No one would
like more than I the steady, tranquil repose of contemplation. Nothing could be
better, nothing sweeter, than the study of the divine treasure far away from the
noise of the world. Such study is sweet and good. On the other hand, preaching,
reprimanding, correcting, building up and attending to the needs of others is a
great burden, a great responsibility, and a great weariness. Who would not wish to
avoid such a burden? But the Gospel affrights me [in Latin: terret me evangelium]."

VI. Learning activities:

1. How do you introduce St. Augustine to those who do not know him?

St. Augustine was the bishop of Hippo (now Annaba, Algeria) from 396 to 430. A renowned

theologian and prolific writer, he was also a skilled preacher and rhetorician. He is one of the
Latin Fathers of the Church and, in Roman Catholicism, is formally recognized
as a doctor of the church.
________________________________________________________________

2. What are the characteristics of St. Augustine that gave you lesson and help you to
growth as a person?

sensitive because I overthink every little thing and I care to much but, in the end, I learned
something new________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________________________

3. Give a brief opinion on the complex life of St. Augustine?

4. What are the good qualities of St. Augustine so he was appointed to become Priest
and Bishop?

St. Augustine is a rich, hot-blooded, highly complex and introspective personality, passionately
Christian, but exquisitely and delicately human, sensitive and courageous, looking with reverence on
Rome, possessed, with Virgil and Cicero, of a Roman love of authority and law, and an African touch
of earth, yet ever withal having the  nostalgia of the infinite. Within Augustine there struggles two
personalities, a mystic, who could forego all forms... and fly straight - 'the alone to the Alone' - with a
champion of ecclesiastical order, resolute to secure the rights of the
Church___________________________

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VII. Assessment:

Make a Journal Writing in this

Lesson
saint Augustine of hippo is a figure in our

history who has appealed to the curiosity

and imagination of many generation. he is

well known for being both sinner and saint,

for being a bishop yet also a fellow pilgrim

on the journey to God. one of the most

popular and attractive person across many

centuries, his influence on the church has

continued to our current day. he also

renowned for his influence in philosophy

and psychology and even art, music and

architecture.

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 Work Sheet
(lesson 5)

Name: Nick Lawrence B. libria_________________ Score ___________

Grade& Section: ______12-OMGC______________Date: ____________

Compose a short thanksgiving prayer for St. Augustine for what he has

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 done for Christianity.

Thanksgiving prayer for St. Augustine

Thanks St. Augustine for adapting
Classical thought to Christian teaching
and created a powerful theological
system of lasting influence
And thank you for inspiring us to make a
good decision in our life
In God’s name I pray AMEN

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