Father Jacques Hamel Cries Out to Humanity.

In my prayer over the last weeks, I have returned over and over to the life and death of Father Jacques Hamel in France. Every time I found myself thinking about him, I wasn’t really sure why. There was something about his story, the way people spoke about him, and the way he died that drew me to know more. I also had a number of encounters since Father Hamel died that kept bringing me back to him. People I spoke to often lamented his death and said things like, “Humanity is just so evil, isn’t it?” I found these phrases at odds with my experience, but I couldn’t explain or put anything into words at the time.

In the wake of what seems like completely senseless violence, I am prone, like the people I quoted above, to despair. I forget my experiences of God’s mercy in my own life and in the lives of those around me and I become anxious about many things (I’m prone to anxiety, anyway, it is worth noting). What can be done in the face of reckless hatred? What should our response be when we are confronted by death? I carried these questions into the week as I dug into the reading for School of Community (page 26-32 of the Fraternity Exercises). I also read the following article, which contains the homily given at the funeral of Father Hamel by his Archbishop, Dominique Lebrun. I found it a particularly moving read in general, and parts of it seemed very relevant to Father Carron’s reflections. In the combination of these texts, I found the beginnings of an answer to the questions that have been captivating me.

http://aleteia.org/2016/08/02/fr-hamel-ordered-begone-satan-as-his-killers-attacked/?ru=07d9f1e39af8fda86f0d72ef9e21f779

First, I noted the Archbishop’s reflection on Father Hamel’s final words: “Begone Satan.” Some of the secular people I had been speaking with about Father Hamel stated openly that these words distressed them. I paraphrase: “This poor old man was duped by religion. In his dying moment he couldn’t see the reality of who was attacking him and blamed a fictitious devil.” Regrettably, I had no response to them at the time, partly because I was still pondering the deeper meaning of his final words myself. But the Archbishop said, almost in reply: “Evil is a mystery. It culminates in horrific moments that takes us beyond what is human. Is this not what you meant, Jacques, with your last words? You fell to the ground after the first stab; you tried to push your attacker with your feet, and you said, ‘Go away, Satan.’ Again you said, ‘Begone, Satan.’ In this you expressed your faith in humanity, created good, but gripped by the devil.” [Italics added for emphasis.] In this you expressed your faith in humanity. Bishop Lebrun believes Father Hamel saw in his attackers fellow human beings twisted by evil, and he reached out to save them at the last moment. He prayed aloud and appealed to their common created humanity; a humanity skewed out of its truth, but nonetheless imbued with the Incarnation. In those two words he said to his attackers, “We have the same heart. Be free from this evil that grips you, even if that evil has already struck me down.” I remember that even Jesus said these same words to Peter, his friend, to call him back when he was lost. Faced with physical assault and certain death, Father Hamel spoke to his attackers the same words of Christ said to Peter. He was trying to save their lives as much as his own. This led me to another realization.

The two young men in that church, as far as we can tell, said “No,” to Father Hamel’s final plea for their lives. But though my own actions are not as evil as theirs, have I not also refused God in my life? Archbishop Lebrun addressed this as well: “It is in our heart, in the depths of our heart that we have to say ‘yes’ or ‘no’ to Jesus, ‘yes’ or ‘no’ to the path of truth and peace; ‘Yes’ or ‘no’ to the victory of love over hatred, ‘yes’ or ‘no’ to his resurrection. The death of Jacques Hamel called me to make a frank ‘yes,’— no, not a tepid yes — a ‘yes’ to life, as the ‘yes’ of Jacques to his ordination. And we must respond yes again and again. God will never force us. God is patient, and God is merciful. Even when I, Dominique, have resisted, and said ‘no’ to love; even when I told God, ‘I will think about it; we will see later,’ even when I have forgotten, God is patient. God expects me because of his infinite mercy.” [Italics added.] Benedict XVI echoed this on page 29 of our School of Community reading: “With every human ‘no’ a new dimension of His love is bestowed and He finds a new and greater way to bring about His ‘yes’ to man, history, and creation.” The Archbishop, Pope Benedict, Father Hamel’s attackers, and I all have something in common: We have said ‘no’ to God in our lives. But Father Hamel is calling out to each of us. He is appealing to our created, shared humanity to bring about a new and greater “yes”. God expects us because of His infinite mercy. I know that Father Hamel’s death has already been efficacious because I can witness the change in myself, as his own Archbishop said. What a mercy that the life and words of an 86 year old priest in France, killed by hatred and a “no” to God’s love, can move even my stubborn heart to say “yes” to Him again.

Holy Saturday Reflection

From an ancient homily on Holy Saturday:

Something strange is happening—there is a great silence on earth today, a great silence and stillness. The whole earth keeps silence because the King is asleep. The earth trembled and is still because God has fallen asleep in the flesh and he has raised up all who have slept ever since the world began. God has died in the flesh and hell trembles with fear.

He has gone to search for our first parent, as for a lost sheep. Greatly desiring to visit those who live in darkness and in the shadow of death, he has gone to free from sorrow the captives Adam and Eve, he who is both God and the son of Eve. The Lord approached them bearing the cross, the weapon that had won him the victory. At the sight of him Adam, the first man he had created, struck his breast in terror and cried out to everyone: “My Lord be with you all.” Christ answered him: “And with your spirit.” He took him by the hand and raised him up, saying: “Awake, O sleeper, and rise from the dead, and Christ will give you light.”

I am your God, who for your sake have become your son. Out of love for you and for your descendants I now by my own authority command all who are held in bondage to come forth, all who are in darkness to be enlightened, all who are sleeping to arise. I order you, O sleeper, to awake. I did not create you to be held a prisoner in hell. Rise from the dead, for I am the life of the dead. Rise up, work of my hands, you who were created in my image. Rise, let us leave this place, for you are in me and I am in you; together we form only one person and we cannot be separated.

For your sake I, your God, became your son; I, the Lord, took the form of a slave; I, whose home is above the heavens, descended to the earth and beneath the earth. For your sake, for the sake of man, I became like a man without help, free among the dead. For the sake of you, who left a garden, I was betrayed to the Jews in a garden, and I was crucified in a garden.

See on my face the spittle I received in order to restore to you the life I once breathed into you. See there the marks of the blows I received in order to refashion your warped nature in my image. On my back see the marks of the scourging I endured to remove the burden of sin that weighs upon your back. See my hands, nailed firmly to a tree, for you who once wickedly stretched out your hand to a tree.

I slept on the cross and a sword pierced my side for you who slept in paradise and brought forth Eve from your side. My side has healed the pain in yours. My sleep will rouse you from your sleep in hell. The sword that pierced me has sheathed the sword that was turned against you.

Rise, let us leave this place. The enemy led you out of the earthly paradise. I will not restore you to that paradise, but I will enthrone you in heaven. I forbade you the tree that was only a symbol of life, but see, I who am life itself am now one with you. I appointed cherubim to guard you as slaves are guarded, but now I make them worship you as God. The throne formed by cherubim awaits you, its bearers swift and eager. The bridal chamber is adorned, the banquet is ready, the eternal dwelling places are prepared, the treasure houses of all good things lie open. The kingdom of heaven has been prepared for you from all eternity.

St. Augustine’s Complicated Defense of Judaism

RLST 4260 – Prof. Elias Sacks

I find myself now in a similar position as I was in around a year ago. In each scenario I entered the fall semester with a presupposition on how St. Augustine, the 4^th century Catholic bishop of Hippo, was known for his extremely negative view toward a specific subject, but upon my own reading, I found his opinion to be rather moderate, if not complicated. Last fall the subject in question was sexual intercourse, and this semester it is the Jewish people and Judaism. While I know that many of my classmates will disagree with me, as was plainly evident during our discussion on his writings, I believe that a close reading of St. Augustine’s works reveals a man who did not hate the Jews or Judaism, and even defended them against his more negative contemporaries. While St. Augustine was in no way definitively kind to the Jews, he vehemently argued for the authority and value of Jewish scripture, on its own terms as well as for the benefit of Christians, and he did the same to a lesser degree for the Jewish people and faith as a whole.

Before delving deeply into what Augustine had to say about all things Jewish, I think it is important to lay out the context within which he worked and lived. Importantly, I want to make a brief appeal that even if Augustine prescribed to the vein of thinking within the early Church Fathers known as contra Iudaeos, this should be importantly distinguished from anti-Semitism. This is a difficult distinction to try to make with 21^st century eyes, but I believe all the more important for the same reasons. We have seen the destruction that rampant anti-Semitism can bring, and we are understandably wary of anything close to it. At the same time we do an injustice to history to not differentiate between a racist, xenophobic trend and one that was based in discourse and disagreement. The Church Fathers understood and wrote about the contra Iudaeos tradition as one based in the sort of religious apologetics commonly coursing around the Mediterranean at that time. Contra Iudaeos was a religious argument by the Church Fathers against the Jews similar in kind to their disputes with the Manicheans, the Arians, and other religious sects of the day. It could not have been based in blind racism, since the Church Fathers, as can be seen with Augustine, understood and celebrated the Jewishness of Jesus and his apostles. Despite all of this, I fully understand that much of the anti-Semitism in Europe and the Middle East has in the past used lines from these early Christian leaders out of context to suit their own needs. Even so, we should not censor or change their true meaning because a certain detestable portion of humanity intentionally misunderstood them years later for their own evil purposes. In fact, I believe that only in making the sort of distinction I want to make and not allowing these words to be stolen for nefarious ends will such a trend be stopped. Let the anti-Semites find other texts to boost up their tainted worldview, because the Church Fathers can no longer serve this purpose.

I understand the previous section of my paper goes somewhat beyond the scope of the prompt or the question at hand, but I think that it is incredibly important. Moving on, I want to first look at the area of Judaism with which Augustine seemed to have dealt most positively: the Old Testament. Augustine seemed very clear throughout his writings that the Old Testament, the Tanakh, should be taken seriously and accepted as scripture by Christians. The strongest, and in my mind most important, way in which Augustine defended the Hebrew Bible was through prophecy fulfillment. Like the other Church Fathers, Augustine believed that nearly every passage within the Old Testament pointed to and was fulfilled in Jesus. While “the promise of eternal life and of the kingdom of heaven pertains to the New Testament,” Augustine argued, the “temporal realities” of the Old Testament “were symbols of things to come.” (Answer to Faustus, p.82) This belief was strong within the Gospels as well as the letters of St. Paul, and Augustine used these texts to flesh out his case. The crux of his argument was that the promises and laws of the Old Testament were temporally bound, appropriate for their time but not now, and therefore could be set aside in practice but not in understanding, as they all pointed to greater realities. To this end he said, “We therefore accept the Old Testament not in order to attain those promises but in order to understand in them the promises of the New Testament.” (Answer to Faustus, p. 82) Christians who adopt this Augustinian take on the Old Testament (and most do) do so with a sense of awe and respect. This process of prophecy and fulfillment made evident only through the course of time is called Salvation History by contemporary Christians, and is seen as essential to a full understanding of their faith. For them, as for Augustine, this history is made evident only through the authority of the Old Testament.

Much of Augustine’s defense of the Hebrew Bible comes from a text called Answer to Faustus, a Manichean, in which the North-African Bishop debates the beliefs of the Manicheans, a Christian sect to which he once belonged. The Manicheans rejected the Old Testament entirely, and Augustine wrote powerfully in defense of the Jewish scripture, but the Manicheans’ main project was to reduce or completely remove the humanity of Jesus. They were strict dualists who viewed anything carnal or bodily as utterly evil, and therefore Jesus, as God, could not have possibly had a true body. Although Augustine did believe the spirit to be ultimately more important than the body, he also did not want to strip the body of all importance, and to refute this heresy, he actually used the Old Testament. As explained above, he believed that the promises and laws of the Old Testament were temporal in nature, but he also argued that they were carnal, or body-driven. The laws and covenants of the Tanakh are all very bodily in nature, from circumcision and kosher rules to Temple sacrifices and clothing regulations. For Augustine, the fact that God originally revealed himself through temporal and carnal realities is itself a prophecy fulfilled in the temporal and carnal aspects of Jesus. As fellow Augustinian apologist Paula Fredriksen said, Augustine saw “history as vital to revelation,” and “flesh as vital to spirit.” (Fredriksen, p. 316)

Augustine viewed the Jewish people’s adherence to such temporal and carnal signs with mixed thoughts, however, and such a mixed view toward the Jewish people and Judaism was common throughout his writings. For instance, Augustine believed the Jews to be in “a miserable kind of spiritual slavery,” as their carnal religion led them to “interpret signs as things, and to be incapable of raising the mind’s eye above the physical creation so as to absorb the eternal light.” (On Christian Teaching, p.72) Yet he went on to explain that the Jews were superior to pagans because at least in their spiritual slavery they were able to come into relationship with the true God. “The signs temporarily imposed on them in their slavery,” he said, “drew the thoughts of those who observed them to the worship of the one God who created heaven and earth.” (On Christian Teaching, p. 73) This very point, Augustine said, placed the Jews spiritually above the pagans and Christian heretics. Indeed, much of his writing on Jews and Judaism came from pieces in which he was attacking these other groups. He said in such places that the Jews were in possession of “useful signs,” and that they were “not that far away” because of these, as opposed to the pagans with their “useless signs,” and “horde of fictitious gods.” (On Christian Teaching, p. 74)

There are yet other aspects of Judaism that challenged Augustine into deep reflection. I wrote above about the prophecy and fulfillment that Christians find within the Old and New Testaments, respectively, but there is a third aspect of this technique: presence. How is such prophecy and subsequent fulfillment to be made present to me now? How are the Jewish people, the prophets in that equation, to be explained now that the fulfillment has occurred? To Augustine, these were challenging questions, precisely because he did attribute value to the Jewish scriptures and the Jewish people. It seems to me that his answers typically sought to explain through finding a balance.

An example of this balance can be found in what I call the Unwilling Witnesses tradition. By using the words of Psalm 59:11, “Slay them not, lest they should at last forget Thy law; scatter them in your might,” Augustine attempted to explain not just how, but why the Jews survived the wrath of the Romans and were dispersed throughout the world. In doing so he also provided these dispersed Jews with a line of defense against any hostile Christians. Augustine thought that the Jews’ survival and dispersion was in part because they were to remain as a sign and witness of God’s mercy and justice toward the people who rejected him, but also because they fulfilled a very necessary role for Christians. As noted, the prophecies concerning Jesus were written in the Old Testament, and the Jews kept those scriptures faithfully wherever they went. Now dispersed to many corners of the world, they brought with them proof that the Christian message of prophetic fulfillment in Jesus was not fictional. The Jews, themselves the religious “enemies” of Christians, actually proved to the Gentiles that these prophecies predated Jesus and were in fact rather ancient. “By their own scriptures,” Augustine pointed out, “they bear witness for us that we have not invented the prophecies of Christ.” (City of God, XVIII.46)

By accepting this Psalm as an explanation of the Diaspora, Augustine also enjoined upon his fellows the other aspects of the verse: “Slay them not, lest they should at last forget Thy law.” The first part of this phrase seems clear enough to Augustine: as God did not find it fitting to slay the Jews, so should not Christians. Somehow those who years later would appropriate other parts of his writings to harm Jews utterly forgot this argument that he makes in one of his most famous works, The City of God. As explained above, Augustine definitely felt that the Jews were serving a purpose for Christians in their continued existence, but he did not seek or advocate for any sort of forced conversion upon them. In a sermon on the subject, he said: “Throughout all nations they remain certainly, and Jews they are, nor have they ceased to be what they were,” a cohesive people that “still retains its own laws, which are the laws of God.” (Sermon on Psalm 59) This leads directly into the second part of the phrase in Psalm 59. Augustine, no matter his motives, believed that the Jews should remain as Jews, because to do anything else would constitute a forgetting of the law of God. Were all Jews to become Christians, it would be as if they had been slain as a people, and they would “at last forget Thy law,” something Augustine thought contrary to the will of God.

While many have taken St. Augustine’s words on the Jews and Judaism out of context for their own ends through the years, I believe a charitable reading of the early Church Father finds a Christian apologist rather than an anti-Semite. “Spiritual people were the patriarchs and prophets and all those in the people of Israel through whom the Holy Spirit provided us with the support and comfort of the scriptures.” (On Christian Teaching, p. 75) These are not the words of a man who blindly hated another people, but rather of one who was engaging in a difficult paradox. Augustine tried to reconcile the clear historical tie between Jews and Christians and the many faith-related genes they share, with the just as obvious differences between them. Looking at a religion other than his own, he claimed that their holy text had not only value but also true authority, that the adherents of that other religion should not be harmed, that they should be allowed to freely practice their faith, and that this practice itself was actually beneficial to other religions, namely his own. What more might we ask of a faithful person? I believe the value that St. Augustine ascribed upon Judaism, a different religion than his own, was a model of true religious tolerance from which the modern world in all its false sensitivities could learn.

Bibliography

Augustine. (2007) Answer to Faustus, a Manichean. (R. Teske, S.J. Trans.) NY: New City Press.

Augustine. (1997). On Christian Teaching. (R.P.H. Green. Trans.) Oxford University Press.

Augustine. (1998). The City of God Against the Pagans. (R.W. Dyson. Trans. Ed.). Cambridge

University Press.

Augustine. (2009). “Exposition on Psalm 59.” Retrieved from New Advent:

http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/1801059.htm

Fredriksen, Paula. (2008). Augustine and the Jews: A Christian Defense of Jews and Judaism.

London: Yale University Press.

St. Augustine: Defender of Sex?

RLST 4260 – Prof. Elias Sacks

In the last few centuries specifically, critics within and without Christianity have pointed at St. Augustine as a fierce critic of sexual intercourse. They say the words of the 4^th century Bishop of Hippo cast a pall over the sexual act and can only be interpreted as harsh and negative, hardly in line with the increasingly progressive views taken up by Western society as a whole today. A closer reading of some of Augustine’s more famous texts, however, as well as some of those hardly known in non-Christian circles, reveals that his opinion might not be as simple as many have thought. In fact, when taking into account his personal and historical context, these texts show that the supposed harshness Augustine aimed at sexual activity was actually rather moderate, and that he preached one of the most progressive sexual ethics of his day.

St. Augustine offered no excuses for sexual intercourse (or sexual activity of any kind) outside of marriage. This point is irrefutable and I will not be engaging in arguing with it. My argument focuses on how Augustine viewed sexual intercourse within marriage, and for this it is important to look first at his personal life before he became a professed Catholic Christian. Augustine himself was never shy in speaking about this subject, in fact he wrote an entire mid-life memoir about his past indiscretions called The Confessions. Early on in The Confessions, Augustine wrote extensively about his inability to control his sexual appetites as a youth and a young man. However, throughout his sometimes explicit descriptions, he maintained that his primary problem at the time was his intentions. He had been seeking out sexual relations for the wrong reasons, that is, for lust rather than love and beauty. He explained that had his intentions been more just, “Then the stormy waves of my youth would have finally broken on the shore of marriage” (The Confessions, 2.2.3). In his mind, marriage would have provided discipline and direction for his sexual desires. Importantly, he did not say that celibacy was the only answer to his problems, as many assert, but that directing his desires toward marriage would have also been acceptable.

In book 8 of The Confessions, another nuance in Augustine’s argument came through. In this section of the story, Augustine dealt with the period of his life just before he made a total conversion to Catholicism. He wrote here that he had essentially made up his mind about the conversion, but his will would still not consent. He describes here how his past actions had created a sort of moral paralysis wherein he could not stop acting out borders on an account of sexual addiction:

[…] bound as I was, not with another’s irons, but by my own iron will. My will the enemy held, and thence had made a chain for me, and bound me. For of a forward will, was a lust made; and a lust served, became custom; and custom not resisted, became necessity. (The Confessions, 8.5.10)

This section and the parts that followed it are important because they show that in Augustine’s mind the main issue keeping him from total conversion was not sexual activity, but rather a weakness of his will and a lack of charity. The sexual sins were merely a product of a deeper problem, and not the root of the problem themselves.

Finally, in book 10 the now-converted Augustine underwent a hindsight examination of conscience wherein he looked at three sins from 1 John 2: 16, those being the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the ambition of the secular world. For the lust of the flesh, the one where his critics might expect Augustine to focus strictly on sexual temptations, he discussed a myriad of sensual passions and desires, including enjoying food too much and being distracted from prayer (The Confessions, 10). On top of that, he seemed much more concerned with the other two sins from 1 John and their results in the life of a Christian. He linked the lust of the eyes to idleness and the ambition of the secular world to the biggest catchword sin: pride (The Confessions, 10). In other words, throughout The Confessions Augustine certainly dealt with sexual passion, but only as one of many kinds of lusts, and all of these were merely symptoms of bigger spiritual problems.

This point seems to have also been made in our course material from Augustine’s other great work: City of God. Throughout book 14 Augustine developed the idea that sexual intercourse, whether within marriage or outside of it, inherently brings a sense of shame onto those who partake. He explained that through original sin, the sin of Adam and Eve, all humanity has fallen into shame to varying degrees in varying areas. The greatest area of shame is sexual intercourse because the sexual act is committed separate from our will, and often against it. He pointed to the anatomy of humans, and specifically how men cannot control the movements of their sexual organs by their will (City of God, 14.18). In our concupiscence, Augustine argued, we have tied up sex so tightly with lust that we have lost control of our will over our body and this is why we hide ourselves when we have sex. The point I want to make here, however, is that Augustine did not say that sex within marriage is a sin, or is wrong in any way. All he pointed out is an explanation for why humans tend to shield themselves when having sex. He goes so far the other way as to call sexual intercourse within marriage “lawful and honorable, indeed” (City of God, 14.18), hardly a fierce criticism of the act.

Next, I want to look at perhaps the most important argument against Augustine’s sexual critics. In his day, sexual ethics were a topic discussed by almost every Christian writer and priest. Interestingly, the general consensus between the majority of these writers, and the public at large, was that celibacy was not only the better path to follow (as St. Paul asserted occasionally throughout his epistles), but also that married couples were somehow made unclean by their sexual activity and might pay for that in the next life. In response, a priest name Jovinian argued that all baptized Christians share in the holiness of the church and that consecrated virgins and celibates are no better than married couples. This sparked outrage among many, not just within the hierarchy, but also within the lay population. Stepping into the fray, Augustine wrote a response to each assertion, one titled On Holy Virginity and the other called Of The Good of Marriage, in the hopes of finding a middle ground. In other words, he wanted to defend the slight superiority of a celibate state of life, while also maintaining the dignity and beauty of marriage.

In Of The Good of Marriage, Augustine presented three specific aspects of marriage that are inherently good: procreation, fidelity of the couple, and a sacramental bond. The first of these is probably not surprising to many of Augustine’s critics. He, like modern Catholics, believed procreation to be one of the essential (and necessary) aspects of sexual intercourse. Augustine did, however, make a radical claim for his time: he claimed that sex and procreation were part of God’s original plan for humans and not something that only came about after the fall (Of the Good of Marriage, §1 and also City of God 14. 23 and 24). Virtually every other Christian thinker of his day believed that sex as a means for procreation was only made necessary after Adam and Eve sinned, and in denying this Augustine brought a newfound dignity to the act itself. If sex was something preordained by God for the perfection of the Garden, then it can’t be looked at as something that might keep humans from heaven. He did caution, though, that sex and procreation are not ends in themselves, but rather good means toward an even better good end, that of human friendship.

“This is all fine and good,” an Augustine critic might say, “so you’ve shown that Augustine thought sex could be good within marriage and for procreation, but what about the pleasurable side of sex? He was definitely against that!” To which I would first make a concession. Without hesitation I will agree that Augustine’s view toward pleasure in sex (and pleasure in general) is definitely more conservative than that of the general public today. I will also point out, though, that he was certainly not Puritanical (despite that later sect of Christianity trying to use his words for their own theology) in his thought. In fact, I find Augustine’s words on pleasure during sex (always with the caveat ‘within marriage’) to be beautiful and instructive. He speaks harshly against lust, as always, but does not link that sin necessarily to pleasure.

First, in Of the Good of Marriage, he wrote, that when a husband and wife enjoy their love-making temperately, “there is interposed a certain gravity of glowing pleasure, when in that wherein husband and wife cleave to one another, they have in mind that they be father and mother” (Of the Good of Marriage, §3). In other words, when husband and wife have sex with the mindset of becoming father and mother (going back to procreation a bit), the pleasure of the sexual experience grows in an acceptable manner. Additionally, he says in another place of the pleasure accompanying sexual intercourse and eating, two natural acts: “both are not without carnal delight: which yet being modified, and by restraint of temperance reduced unto the use after nature, cannot be lust” (Of the Good of Marriage, §18). So, Augustine links pleasure in sex to pleasure in eating, both necessary actions for the “conservation of the race” (ibid.), and both to actually be enjoyed in temperance. In the modern health-conscious world I think we can understand this reasoning. I know many in Boulder who would encourage others to have as much sex as they like, while curbing and tempering their overeating. Augustine would say these Boulderites are on the right path, but just need to follow the philosophy through to other bodily appetites as well.

In the second of the three aspects of marriage that Augustine gave dignity to in Of the Good of Marriage, namely fidelity, one can find another defense of pleasure. For Augustine, fidelity meant not only avoiding sex outside of the marriage, but also something more than just that negative command. He wrote that fidelity included a positive obligation of married persons to engage in sex in hopes of helping each other avoid infidelity; that married persons owe one another sex as “a mutual service of sustaining one another’s weakness, in order to shun unlawful intercourse” (Of the Good of Marriage, §6). To this end, Augustine wrote, “Therefore the ornament of marriage is chastity of begetting (procreation), and faith of yielding the due of the flesh: this is the work of marriage, this the Apostle (Paul) defends from every charge” (Of the Good of Marriage, §12, emphasis and parentheses added). In another place Augustine even backed off of his typical vilification of lust. He said that if one spouse has sex with the other purely out of lust, that person has only committed a venialis culpa, a venial or forgivable sin (Of the Good of Marriage, §6.). In one of his later sermons, Augustine expanded on this thought. He said that if one spouse has sex with the other because the other could not contain his or her lust, the first spouse not only has not sinned, but has actually committed an act of charity and mercy for the other (Augustine, Sermon 354A.).

This final argument about how Augustine viewed pleasure within the marital act really sealed the deal for me. While it is abundantly clear that Augustine believed, like his predecessor Paul, that celibacy for the Kingdom of God was the most ideal life pattern for Christians to undertake, he by no means saw it as a singular vocation. The most natural vocation in the eyes of Augustine was marriage, and within marriage naturally followed sexual intercourse. Augustine argued with many of his more ascetic contemporaries on many points, but none more avidly than how sex is natural and ordained by God as a good within marriage. Certainly Augustine saw sex’s primary goal as procreation, but he did not deny the other positive aspects of the act. In the opinion of Augustine sex within marriage, even if done only for lustful means, could build holy unity between the spouses, drawing them nearer to God. Rather than declaring pleasure of this kind as gravely sinful, Augustine said it is entirely forgivable, even to the point that one should aid one’s spouse in satisfying the spouse’s lustful desires. These arguments may not persuade the staunchest of anti-Augustine critics, but they should at the very least serve to show that St. Augustine was not a vehement enemy of sexual intercourse within the context of marriage. I hope that those more stubborn critics might at least be swayed to take a further look at the entirety of Augustine’s prolific body of work rather than picking and choosing a few infamous phrases upon which to build their opinions of such a complex and rich historical character.

Bibliography

Augustine. (1838). The Confessions. (E.B. Pusey, Trans.). Franklin Center, PA: The Franklin

Library. (Original work written in 398).

Augustine. (1887). Of the Good of Marriage. (C.L. Cornish, Trans.). In The Catholic

Encyclopedia. Retrieved from New Advent: http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/1309.htm. (Original work written in 410).

Augustine. (1958). The City of God. (G.G. Walsh, et al. Trans.). New York, NY: Doubleday,

Image Books (Original work written around 410).

Augustine. (1997). Sermon 354A. (E. Hill, Trans.) In Sermons (III/11): The Works of St.

Augustine, A Translation for the 21^st Century. Hyde Park, NY: New City Press. (Original work written around 397. Originally translated by F. Dolbeau).

Late Have I Loved You.

(Still the most beautiful prayer I have ever come across, and it is just as relevant to me today as the first time I read it.)

 

Late have I loved you, O Beauty ever ancient, ever new, late have I loved you!
You were within me, but I was outside, and it was there that I searched for you.
In my unloveliness, I plunged into the lovely things which you created.
You were with me, but I was not with you.
Created things kept me from you; yet if they had not been in you, they would have not been at all.
You called, you shouted, and you broke through my deafness.
You flashed, you shone, and you dispelled my blindness.
You breathed your fragrance on me; I drew in breath and now I pant for you.
I have tasted you, now I hunger and thirst for more.
You touched me, and I burned for your peace.

-St. Augustine

Campion’s Brag.

I recently began to read more about St. Edmund Campion and I love his story! St. Edmund Campion (1540-1581) was an Englishman who left his country because he desired to join the Catholic Church. After studying under St. Ignatius Loyola in Europe and becoming a Jesuit, St. Edmund was sent back to England to evangelize his people. Upon hearing of his return, the leaders of the English government hunted him without reprieve. He jumped from Catholic home to Catholic home celebrating Mass, preaching, and narrowly avoiding capture. He famously wrote this letter, explanation of his mission, and defense of the faith to his pursuers. Though he titled the apologia, “Challenge to the Privy Council,” the English disparagingly referred to it as “Campion’s Brag,” the title by which it is most commonly known today. It is one of the earliest defenses of the faith to appear in the English language during the Reformation. St. Edmund was eventually captured, tortured, subjected to a fixed trial, and then hanged, drawn and quartered at the Tyburn. St. Edmund Campion, pray for us!

 

To the Right Honourable, the Lords of Her Majesty’s Privy Council:

Whereas I have come out of Germany and Bohemia, being sent by my superiors, and adventured myself into this noble realm, my dear country, for the glory of God and benefit of souls, I thought it like enough that, in this busy, watchful, and suspicious world, I should either sooner or later be intercepted and stopped of my course.

Wherefore, providing for all events, and uncertain what may become of me, when God shall haply deliver my body into durance, I supposed it needful to put this in writing in a readiness, desiring your good lordships to give it your reading, for to know my cause. This doing, I trust I shall ease you of some labour. For that which otherwise you must have sought for by practice of wit, I do now lay into your hands by plain confession. And to the intent that the whole matter may be conceived in order, and so the better both understood and remembered, I make thereof these nine points or articles, directly, truly and resolutely opening my full enterprise and purpose.

i. I confess that I am (albeit unworthy) a priest of the Catholic Church, and through the great mercy of God vowed now these eight years into the religion [religious order] of the Society of Jesus. Hereby I have taken upon me a special kind of warfare under the banner of obedience, and also resigned all my interest or possibility of wealth, honour, pleasure, and other worldly felicity.

ii. At the voice of our General, which is to me a warrant from heaven and oracle of Christ, I took my voyage from Prague to Rome (where our General Father is always resident) and from Rome to England, as I might and would have done joyously into any part of Christendom or Heatheness, had I been thereto assigned.

iii. My charge is, of free cost to preach the Gospel, to minister the Sacraments, to instruct the simple, to reform sinners, to confute errors—in brief, to cry alarm spiritual against foul vice and proud ignorance, wherewith many of my dear countrymen are abused.

iv. I never had mind, and am strictly forbidden by our Father that sent me, to deal in any respect with matter of state or policy of this realm, as things which appertain not to my vocation, and from which I gladly restrain and sequester my thoughts.

v. I do ask, to the glory of God, with all humility, and under your correction, three sorts of indifferent and quiet audiences: the first, before your Honours, wherein I will discourse of religion, so far as it toucheth the common weal and your nobilities: the second, whereof I make more account, before the Doctors and Masters and chosen men of both universities, wherein I undertake to avow the faith of our Catholic Church by proofs innumerable—Scriptures, councils, Fathers, history, natural and moral reasons: the third, before the lawyers, spiritual and temporal, wherein I will justify the said faith by the common wisdom of the laws standing yet in force and practice.

vi. I would be loath to speak anything that might sound of any insolent brag or challenge, especially being now as a dead man to this world and willing to put my head under every man’s foot, and to kiss the ground they tread upon. Yet I have such courage in avouching the majesty of Jesus my King, and such affiance in his gracious favour, and such assurance in my quarrel, and my evidence so impregnable, and because I know perfectly that no one Protestant, nor all the Protestants living, nor any sect of our adversaries (howsoever they face men down in pulpits, and overrule us in their kingdom of grammarians and unlearned ears) can maintain their doctrine in disputation. I am to sue most humbly and instantly for combat with all and every of them, and the most principal that may be found: protesting that in this trial the better furnished they come, the better welcome they shall be.

vii. And because it hath pleased God to enrich the Queen my Sovereign Lady with notable gifts of nature, learning, and princely education, I do verily trust that if her Highness would vouchsafe her royal person and good attention to such a conference as, in the second part of my fifth article I have motioned, or to a few sermons, which in her or your hearing I am to utter such manifest and fair light by good method and plain dealing may be cast upon these controversies, that possibly her zeal of truth and love of her people shall incline her noble Grace to disfavour some proceedings hurtful to the realm, and procure towards us oppressed more equity.

viii. Moreover I doubt not but you, her Highness’ Council, being of such wisdom and discreet in cases most important, when you shall have heard these questions of religion opened faithfully, which many times by our adversaries are huddled up and confounded, will see upon what substantial grounds our Catholic Faith is builded, how feeble that side is which by sway of the time prevaileth against us, and so at last for your own souls, and for many thousand souls that depend upon your government, will discountenance error when it is bewrayed [revealed], and hearken to those who would spend the best blood in their bodies for your salvation. Many innocent hands are lifted up to heaven for you daily by those English students, whose posterity shall never die, which beyond seas, gathering virtue and sufficient knowledge for the purpose, are determined never to give you over, but either to win you heaven, or to die upon your pikes. And touching our Society, be it known to you that we have made a league—all the Jesuits in the world, whose succession and multitude must overreach all the practice of England—cheerfully to carry the cross you shall lay upon us, and never to despair your recovery, while we have a man left to enjoy your Tyburn, or to be racked with your torments, or consumed with your prisons. The expense is reckoned, the enterprise is begun; it is of God; it cannot be withstood. So the faith was planted: So it must be restored.

ix. If these my offers be refused, and my endeavours can take no place, and I, having run thousands of miles to do you good, shall be rewarded with rigour. I have no more to say but to recommend your case and mine to Almighty God, the Searcher of Hearts, who send us his grace, and see us at accord before the day of payment, to the end we may at last be friends in heaven, when all injuries shall be forgotten.

Do Not Look with Fear.

Do not look with fear
on the changes and chances of this life;
rather look to them with full faith that as they arise,
God – whose you are – will deliver you out of them.

He has kept you hitherto.
Do not but hold fast to His dear hand,
and He will lead you safely through all things;
and when you cannot stand, He will bear you in His arms.

Do not anticipate what will happen tomorrow.
The same everlasting Father who cares for you today
will take care of you tomorrow and every day.
Either He will shield you from suffering, or
He will give you unfailing strength to bear it.

Be at peace, then, and put aside all anxious thoughts and imaginations.

 

-St. Francis de Sales

The Christian in the World

From the “Letter to Diognetus,” a Christian epistle written in the late 100’s AD. This section of the manuscripts is titled, “The Relation of Christians to the World,” and it shows a beautiful glimpse into what the early Church was like, and how we Christians are all called to live even today. Notice how little the times, as well as the teachings of the Church, have changed:

 

 

“Christians are indistinguishable from other men either by nationality, language or customs. They do not inhabit separate cities of their own, or speak a strange dialect, or follow some outlandish way of life. Their teaching is not based upon reveries inspired by the curiosity of men. Unlike some other people, they champion no purely human doctrine. With regard to dress, food and manner of life in general, they follow the customs of whatever city they happen to be living in, whether it is Greek or foreign.

And yet there is something extraordinary about their lives. They live in their own countries as though they were only passing through. They play their full role as citizens, but labor under all the disabilities of aliens. Any country can be their homeland, but for them their homeland, wherever it may be, is a foreign country. Like others, they marry and have children, but they do not abort them. They share their meals, but not their wives.

They live in the flesh, but they are not governed by the desires of the flesh. They pass their days upon earth, but they are citizens of heaven. Obedient to the laws, they yet live on a level that transcends the law. Christians love all men, but all men persecute them. Condemned because they are not understood, they are put to death, but raised to life again. They live in poverty, but enrich many; they are totally destitute, but possess an abundance of everything. They suffer dishonor, but that is their glory. They are defamed, but vindicated. A blessing is their answer to abuse, deference their response to insult. For the good they do they receive the punishment of malefactors, but even then they rejoice, as though receiving the gift of life. They are attacked by the Jews as aliens, they are persecuted by the Greeks, yet no one can explain the reason for this hatred.

To speak in general terms, we may say that the Christian is to the world what the soul is to the body. As the soul is present in every part of the body, while remaining distinct from it, so Christians are found in all the cities of the world, but cannot be identified with the world. As the visible body contains the invisible soul, so Christians are seen living in the world, but their religious life remains unseen. The body hates the soul and wars against it, not because of any injury the soul has done it, but because of the restriction the soul places on its pleasures. Similarly, the world hates the Christians, not because they have done it any wrong, but because they are opposed to its enjoyments.

Christians love those who hate them just as the soul loves the body and all its members despite the body’s hatred. It is by the soul, enclosed within the body, that the body is held together, and similarly, it is by the Christians, detained in the world as in a prison, that the world is held together. The soul, though immortal, has a mortal dwelling place; and Christians also live for a time amidst perishable things, while awaiting the freedom from change and decay that will be theirs in heaven. As the soul benefits from the deprivation of food and drink, so Christians flourish under persecution. Such is the Christian’s lofty and divinely appointed function, from which he is not permitted to excuse himself.”

Introduction to the Devout Life: Part 1, Section 3

Excerpts from Part 1, Section 3, “Devotion is Compatible with Every Vocation and Profession,” in the book Introduction to the Devout Life by St. Francis de Sales.

Paragraph 2:
“I ask you, Philothea, is it right that a bishop should lead the solitary life of a Carthusian? Or that married people should lay up no greater store than a Capuchin? If a tradesman were to remain the whole day in church, like the religious, or if the religious were continually exposed to difficulties in the service of his neighbor, as the bishop is, would not such devotion be ridiculous, preposterous, and unsupportable?”

Paragraph 4:
“It is an error, or rather a heresy, to say that devotion is incompatible with the life of a soldier, a tradesman, a prince, or a married woman. It is true, Philothea, that a purely contemplative, monastic, or religious devotion cannot be practiced in those vocations. But besides these three kinds of devotion, there are several others appropriate for leading those who live in the secular state to perfection.”

Paragraph 5:
“In the New Testament, Saint Joseph, Lydia, and Saint Crispin practiced perfect devotion in their workplaces; Saint Ann, Saint Martha, Saint Monica, Aquila, Priscilla, in their families; Cornelius, Saint Sebastian, Saint Maurice, in the army; and Constantine, Helena, Saint Louis, Blessed Amadaeus, and Saint Edward from the throne.”

Paragraph 6:
“No, it has happened that many have lost perfection in the desert who has preserved it in the world, which seems so little favorable to perfection. ‘Lot,’ says Saint Gregory, ‘who was so chaste in the city, defiled himself in the wilderness.’ Wherever we are, we can and should aspire to a perfect life.”

-St. Francis de Sales

Introduction to the Devout Life: Part 1, Section 2

Excerpts from Part 1, Section 2, “Nature and Excellence of Devotion,” in the book Introduction to the Devout Life by St. Francis de Sales.

Paragraph 3:
“The world sees devout people fasting, praying, suffering injuries, serving the sick, and giving alms to the poor. It sees them watch over themselves, restrain their anger, stifle their passions, deprive themselves of sensual pleasures, and perform other actions that are in themselves painful and rigorous. But the world does not discern the inward, heartfelt devotion that renders all these actions pleasant, sweet, and easy.”

Paragraph 4:
“The fires, flames, wheels, and swords seemed to be flowers and perfumes to the martyrs because they were devout.”

Paragraph 5:
“It (devotion) removes discontent from the poor, solicitude from the rich, sadness from the oppressed, insolence from the exalted, melancholy from the solitary, and dissipation from him that is in company. It serves well for warmth in the winter as for dew in summer. It knows how to use abundance as well as how to suffer want, and how to render honor and contempt equally profitable. In a word, it entertains pleasures and pain with equanimity, and replenishes the soul with an admirable sweetness.”

Paragraph 7:
“Believe me, dear Philothea, devotion is the quintessence of pleasures, the queen of virtues, and the perfection of love. If love is milk, devotion is the cream. If love is a plant, devotion is its flower. If love is a precious stone, devotion is its luster. If love is a rich balm, devotion is its odor — yes, the odor of sweetness, which comforts men and makes angels rejoice.”

-St. Francis de Sales