40 Days with St. Augustine

St. Augustine of Hippo (354-430 AD) was one of the great teachers of the Christian church.  The class will introduce you to his abiding wisdom as you do one short devotional reading from his writings per day for the 40 days of Lent.  Each student needs to get a copy of “Early Will I Seek You: A 40-Day Journey in the Company of Augustine,” by David Hazard (available in a printed or digital version from the publisher’s web site or Amazon or your favorite bookseller).    The purpose of the book and class is “rekindling the inner fire,” as we, to use the words of Augustine himself, “set out on the street of love together making for Him of whom it is said, ‘Seek His face always.’”   Augustine is just as good a contemporary guide to that seeking as he was an ancient one.

The first class will set Augustine in his context of the late Fourth and early Fifth Century Roman Empire (See the slides for the Introduction class below). Augustine’s era was a time of monumental change, a time very different from, yet a “distant mirror” of, our own. Augustine, bishop, philosopher, and saint, was an astute observer of human psychology, of our virtues and of our depravities. His vision was of cosmic scope. How do human beings see themselves situated in our visible universe of space and time? Augustine bequeathed to Western civilization a sense of the forward movement of history and a sense of our restless selves ever thirsting for divine love: we are pilgrims on a journey. How should we live amongst the entangled ways of the City of God and City of Man? What is good, and why is there evil? How do we come to “see” God? How are we to order our desires rightly in the light of Christ–our love of things, our love of others, and our love of God? These questions are just as alive today as they were in Augustine’s era.

The title of our text comes from the opening verse of Psalm 63 from the King James’s Bible, here in the New KJV:

"O God, You are my God;
Early will I seek You;
My soul thirsts for You;
My flesh longs for You
In a dry and thirsty land
Where there is no water."

Please do each of the short readings from Augustine, one each day between Ash Wednesday and our last class in Holy Week. These readings selected by the author come from a variety of Augustine’s many writings. Savor the passages, reflect and meditate on them. Keep a journal if you like. Pray. Read them and re-read them. Let them sink in. Let them wash over you as cleansing waters for repentance, as refreshing waters of vision, as quenching waters for unfulfilled thirst, as the living waters of the Spirit, the Giver of Life.

Except for the first class, which will situate us in Augustine’s context, we will spend our time discussing these reading. I hope many of you will be willing to contribute your own thoughts, but you are welcome simply to listen if you prefer.

This link gives additional material on Augustine and a bibliography of some of his works including those from which our readings come.