Augustine: Philosopher and Saint

So, a month or so ago I listened to a Great Courses lecture series entitled, Augustine: Philosopher and Saint. A good listen, but I was struck negatively by many of his thoughts on what I think of as the hard parts of dogma.

This past week has been mostly field work at the farm and I've taken the time to listen again to the course. It is a strange thing how I can hear one thing one time and something entirely different another.

No mistaking, the parts on Predestination, Original Sin and The Trinity seem to me to be intellectual messing about that is quite foreign to the take that I have on scripture, on the Christian faith.

That being said, what I have heard on second listen was a man struggling to capture the essence of what his faith was grounded in.

The piecing together by Augustine of an elegant exposition on our relationship to God, and more importantly, God's relationship with us was nothing short of transformative for me.

Over the course of two afternoons plodding away in the rain I gained a bridge between my faith as that which exists in me, or that which exists through controlled expression within my community, and my faith as my relationship with God, expressed in how I relate with others across the board, day to day.

This may not seem such a big thing to many, but for me it is. I have never had trouble maintaining relationships, particularly when they are contained in well trod ruts. Augustine talks of relationships that transcend our comfortable patterns. In this manner I have always failed, apart perhaps from my relationships with my kids.

I cannot but wonder if the lack of the insight that I have found in this course, and through re-reading Confessions and City of God, after listening to it again isn't what has kept me somewhat isolated over the years. Certainly I think that playing safe in personal relationships is almost a guarantee of those relationships being short-lived. Having weathered three marriages I speak from some experience in this matter.

I find myself looking back over the past few years and viewing failed relationships in the light of the understanding that I seem now to have gained.

Well, we don't get many chances to undo the past. I'll look forward to the future to see if the change that has rolled through me is as deep as it seems.

My kids tell me that I think too much. They may be right, but when a person or a book or some other media reveals deep insights to me, especially when those insights then transform me going forward, I say, think on...