Wednesday, August 27, 2008

Augustine, Patron of Backsliders

Another excerpt from St Augustine's "Confessions" (Bk 7, Ch 17) which some of us can identify with, and which can give us hope and encouragement as we seek to love the Lord and only Him, but find ourselves being weighed down by our old habits.

And I marveled that I now loved thee, and no phantasm in thy stead, and yet I was not stable enough to enjoy my God steadily. Instead I was transported to thee by thy beauty, and then presently torn away from thee by my own weight, sinking with grief into these lower things. This weight was carnal habit. But thy memory dwelt with me, and I never doubted in the least that there was One for me to cleave to; but I was not yet ready to cleave to thee firmly. For the body which is corrupted presses down the soul, and the earthly dwelling weighs down the mind, which muses upon many things.

... And I saw thy invisibility understood by means of the things that are made. But I was not able to sustain my gaze. My weakness was dashed back, and I lapsed again into my accustomed ways, carrying along with me nothing but a loving memory of my vision, and an appetite for what I had, as it were, smelled the odor of, but was not yet able to eat.

Happy Feast day!

No comments: