St. Augustine: A Restless Heart
Br. Lain Wilson
It’s telling that the Reverend John Ames, the protagonist of Marilynne Robinson’s novel Gilead, takes Augustine as one of the measures of his life’s work: “I’ve written two hundred twenty-five books, which puts me up there with Augustine and Calvin for quantity.”
Augustine, born in 354 in Roman North Africa, stands as a Titan in the history of western Christianity. He moved from the provinces to the imperial center, in Milan, where he was a teacher of rhetoric. Coming under the influence of that city’s bishop, Ambrose, he converted to Catholic Christianity, was baptized, and returned to North Africa, eventually being made bishop of Hippo.
In that role, he set himself up as a fierce defender of Catholic Christianity against various sects: Donatists, Manichaeans, Pelagians. These defenses, along with his volumes of letters, sermons, treatises, and scriptural commentaries, ensured his legacy through the medieval and early modern periods, and indeed into our present.
But it is his autobiography, the Confessions, that serves as a first point of contact for so many. And if in his treatises we find blistering criticisms of those he attacked, he does not spare himself in his Confessions. A work of supreme introspection, it traces his life from his birth, detailing his movement toward and away from God, the time spent in the intellectual and spiritual cul-de-sacs of Manichaeism and Neoplatonism, and his own struggle to overcome the banality of sin—his pride in intellectual achievement, his joy in being at the center of things, the pleasures of sex, even the theft of a single pear in his youth. If in so much of his writing Augustine can seem intimidating, in his Confessions he is all too human.
If in so much of his writing Augustine can seem intimidating, in his Confessions he is all too human.
Book 9 has always been a favorite of mine. It details two converging movements: his baptism, along with his son and a friend, and deaths, of two friends and, most affectingly, of his mother, Monica. Monica is a looming figure in the Confessions, coming in and out of Augustine’s life, constantly expressing her hope that her son will adopt her Catholic Christian faith. Augustine recounts that, as he was a candidate for baptism, “My mother clung closely to us, with a woman’s demeanor, a man’s loyalty, an old woman’s assurance, a mother’s love, and a Christian’s devotion.”
At the convergence of these two movements is a shared vision of the new life: a life assured through participation in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ in baptism, and a life that is imminent as Monica’s own earthly pilgrimage draws to a close. Augustine recounts the end of this vision: “Suppose this [vision] were to be prolonged, and other visions of a far lesser kind were to be taken away, and this single vision would ravish and draw in and hide in its inward joys the one who sees it, so that life without end would be like this moment of understanding was, for which we’ve sighed.”
After years of striving for a glimpse of the Eternal through his own efforts—and against the expressed desires of his mother—Augustine had found in his surrender to God through baptism that long-desired experience, that long-desired vision.
This is the Augustine I pray with—restless and wrestling, moving forward and backward, intimidating in his intellect but so very human in struggling to simply let go. It was in finally surrendering, in finally entering into the resurrection life in baptism, that Augustine finally saw the joy of that new life. The joy of a life resting in God: “In yourself you rouse us,” he writes, at the very beginning of his Confessions, “giving us delight in glorifying you, because you made us with yourself as our goal, and our heart is restless until it rests in you.”
Questions for Reflection
Monica, Augustine’s mother, played a pivotal role in his spiritual journey, persistently praying for his conversion.
Think of someone in your life who has had a lasting influence on your faith. How have they encouraged or challenged you? How can you serve as a spiritual influence for others?
Augustine wrote, “Our heart is restless until it rests in you.”
How does this idea resonate with your own experience?
Do you ever feel restless? What are ways you have found peace or rest in God?
