RBWords

     The influence of the teachings and writings of St. Augustine of Hippo in the western Catholic Church is enormous.  We Dominicans are impacted daily by his "rule" that he wrote for the community gathered around him in his diocese in North Africa.  When Dominic sought official recognition of his little group in Southern France, Pope Innocent III told him he had to adopt one of the "rules" already approved in the church.  Up till that time (13th century) the only form of religious life in the church was monastic.  What Dominic was proposing was completely new.  Dominic and his little group adopted the Rule of St. Augustine, which allows for the possibility of external apostolic work.  To this day, the Rule of St. Augustine is printed at the front of the Constitutions of the Friars Preachers.  Many other religious orders such as the Augustinians and congregations of women religious also consider this rule to be their guide.

     However, Augustine's influence is much broader.  His CONFESSIONS remains one of the great classics of Christian literature and inspires students across the ages.  His more doctrinal works found their way into St. Thomas Aquinas' SUMMA THEOLOGICA and other great theologians' works.  The doctrine of "original sin" comes from Augustine, among many other teachings.

     All of this came from a man who was trained as a teacher of "rhetoric" (public speaking), who lived with a mistress for many years and fathered a son, and was ultimately converted to Christianity by St. Ambrose (with the help of his Christian mother's - St. Monica's - prayers.  One line of his from the CONFESSIONS stays with me: "You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our hearts will not rest until they rest in you."  That seems to me to echo what I quoted above from 1 Thessalonians, which describes Augustine's life as a bishop.  Today is his day!  AMEN