Augustine’s Conversion: A Key to Understanding his Spirituality
Fr. Eusebio Berdon, OSA, former Father Provincial of the Augustinian Order - Sto. Nino Cebu – Province, wrote an article concerning Augustine’s conversion. Fr. Berdon claims that “on August 28, the universal Church, and the whole Augustinian family celebrated the Feast of our great father, Saint Augustine, a proclaimed Doctor and Father of the Church, and the occasion was appropriate for reflection on the many aspects of his life or the variety of topics in his teachings. To discuss the relevance of Augustine’s conversion is important in the understanding of his Spirituality, and on the need, therefore, to constantly celebrate such event among us. Every celebration of his feast is a celebration of his conversion.
To place in proper perspective, this sharing on the conversion of Saint Augustine, Pope Paul VI declared: “For us, Saint Augustine is an always productive mind, or better yet, an ever-flowing fountain. One never finishes admiring or drawing from his words, his insights, and the richness of his Spirit, treasures which can be of great importance, not only for scholarship and for the religious life ... but also for that of the modern world. He is the one who has spoken of the Interior Master better than anyone else (“Show Your Love for Augustine..” Living in Freedom under Grace, Rome: 1979, p. 38).
It is obvious from the above papal statement that a celebration of the conversion of this great “man for all seasons”, is not simply a re-enactment of that moving drama in the garden of Milan, faithfully recorded and transmitted to us through the immortal book of the author, The Confessions, but a celebration of the return to God of a great multitude, and whose spirit and wisdom have renewed, strengthened, and even transformed the life of the Church herself.
Concretely, in celebrating the conversion of Augustine, we pay tribute to a man who has discovered the true meaning of life after a long, tortuous, and painful search; we proclaim to the whole world the ever alive Christian hope for personal and eventually social transformation, because of the dynamic presence of God’s grace and Spirit; and we perform an act of faith in the transforming work of the same Spirit in our personal lives, and in our communities. To celebrate this event is to honor the man, to pray to our God, and to proclaim the good news.
Augustine himself would have wanted us to retell the story of his conversion. As Jose Rodriquez, commenting on Augustine’s proselytizing temperament, rightly remarks: “He was a man who felt an impressible need for sharing with his friends his restlessness and discoveries... Augustinian proselytism becomes more vividly active when it is a question of sharing values capable of giving meaning to human existence. Every time Augustine thought he had a way of salvation, he felt the powerful urge to show it to others and to travel in their company (“The Search for God and Apostolate..” Searching for God, Rome: 1981, pp. 301-31).
Augustine’s Internal Journey
The life of Augustine is an open book to us who have read his previously mentioned great book, The Confessions. There is no need, therefore, to retell it here. But for the sake of having a comprehensive view of his internal journey, it is necessary to underline a few but important factors that contributed to the transformation of his life.
Despite having a great and saintly mother or a catechist during his early childhood, Augustine perhaps because of his father’s influence or simply because of universally shared shortcomings of born Catholics, that is, presumed conviction towards one’s inherited faith – led the normal life of a boy of his time with a semi-pagan culture. The only difference was that he was gifted with a brilliant mind, a genial character, and a strong sense of dedication to whatever task he had at hand. Moreover, he was, in his own right, the ambition of having a better life than that of many of his peers. This means more education, and eventually more money, honor, and power.
His first conversion, as he tells us, took place after reading a philosophy book of Cicero titled “Hortensius”. The book propounds the stoic doctrine that the happiness of man does not exist in the possession of wealth, honor, or power, but in the possession of wisdom. Let us humbly listen to Augustine himself: “The prescribed course of study brought me to a work by an author named Cicero...the title of the book is Hortensius, and it recommends the reader to study philosophy. According to Augustine: “It altered my outlook in life. It changed my prayers to You, O Lord, and provided me with new hopes and aspirations. All my empty dreams suddenly lost their charm and my heart began to throb with a bewildering passion for the wisdom of eternal truth. I began to climb out of the depths to which I had sunk, to return to You, My God, how I burned with longing to have wings to carry me back to You, away from all earthly things, although I had no idea what You would do with me!” (Conf. 3.4).
From this moment, at the age of nineteen, Augustine spent most of the time looking for this philosophical ideal. And this search, brought him to the fold of religious sects, like Manichaeism. Augustine, however, soon discovered the shallowness of the teachings of these sects, and when already in Milan, as panegyrist of the Emperor, he began listening to the sermons delivered by a former governor of the city, now the Catholic bishop, Saint Ambrose, and the edifying presence of the Church and her leaders led to Augustine’s second conversion: acceptance of the authority of the Church and the Sacred Scriptures. As Boyer says: “The complete conversion which has to transform his heart and life will occur later. But his adhesion to the Church, the conviction that she possesses the truth, in other words, his return to the true faith, is taking place at this time” (cited by Capanaga, V. In “S. Agustin en nuestrotiempo....’Augustinus: 1956, p. 38).
Capanaga himself adds: “In Milan, the Church showed itself as a social entity, firm and evident, attracting the attention of all with the strong presence of Christ. These things above all impress the young professor from Carthage, the crowd of the faithful, the sanctity and leadership of the Church” (ibid. p. 39).
Despite this positive impression, Augustine still entertained some doubts particularly in the understanding of some doctrines, like the divinity of the Word, Christ. While finding himself in this predicament, Neo-Platonism came to his aid. And this is described by some authors as the third conversion of Augustine.
Briefly, following the doctrine of Plato, this school of philosophy claims that the visible world is but a manifestation or reflection of the “spiritual world”, the world of ideas (Spirit), which, in turn, is the creation of the Absolute (Unum), through the instrumentality of the Word (Logos). Since the true home of the spirit or soul is in the realm of the spiritual, it is, but natural that creatures should yearn and search for their origin. Man, particularly, a rational creation, enjoys a privilege, through interior illumination, of having the power to communicate with or contemplate this Unum (God) in this life. Now, while Augustine did not fully accept this purely philosophical explanation of the spiritual origin of man – he believed in the God of the Scriptures, who directly created man and other creatures – he found answers to some of the intellectual doubts. With this acceptance of the Divine Revelation and the Authority of the Church (Magisterium), his heart was ready for a complete conversion. As to understanding of the concept of spiritual substances, and therefore of the concept of a spiritual God, his reading of the books of Plato and his disciples, the Platonists, led him to a method of research similar to today’s transcendental meditation whereby he was able to arrive at a certain contemplative experience of God. Augustine likes to read the Platonists especially on their idea of God; how the world is a manifestation of the Divine and how the Spirit of God is present in all things.
But for a time still, Augustine remained uncommitted. In the words of Capanaga, (op.cit., p. 37), he was convinced but not touched, that is, the conversion was more intellectual than effective. Augustine himself confirms this: “The words of your Scriptures were planted firmly in my heart... Of you, eternal life I was certain... But in my worldly life, all was confusion... I should have been glad to follow the right road, to follow our Savior Himself, but still, I could not make up my mind to venture along the narrow path” (Conf. 8.1).
Only after a painful period of struggle, through study, prayer, and dialogue with close friends, Augustine was able to arrive at that dramatic climax of his return to God. Vividly, he describes the scene to us: “I probed the hidden depths of my soul and wrung its pitiful secrets from it, and when I mastered them all before the eyes of my heart, a great storm broke within me, bringing with it a great deluge of tears... For I felt that I was still the captive of my sins, and in my misery, I kept crying, how long shall I go on saying ‘Tomorrow, tomorrow? Why not now? Why not make an end of my ugly sins at this moment? I was asking myself these questions... when all at once I heard the singing voice of a child ...Take it and read, take it, and read’” (Tolle lege experience).
“So, I hurried back to the place where Alypius was sitting... (where) I had put down the book containing Paul’s Epistles. I seized it and I opened it, and in silence, I read the first passage: “not in reveling and drunkenness... in an instant, as I came to the end of the sentence, it was as though the light of confidence flooded into my heart and all the darkness of doubt was dispelled” (Conf. 7.12).
The process of conversion of Saint Augustine did not end here. It was only a turning point in his life during which he, with his whole being, embraces GOD. But that was just the beginning of a life with and for GOD. Jose Rubio, on this point, observes: “It would be wrong to presuppose that the Augustinian crisis was solved in the garden of Milan. For many years after, he would exert effort to uncover the existential mystery of his conversion and explain the more intimate and personal aspects of the experience... Later, his experience will be projected socially with a universal application, thus, illustrating and supporting the Christian tradition” (Haciaunateoria Augustinian de la conversion”, Augustinus 9, 1964, p. 472).