The Theology Of Augustines Confessions

This study of Augustine's Confessions presents his testimony of conversion as an antidote to modern culture's tendency toward disbelief.

Presents an English translation of Saint Augustine's "Confessions" in which the fourth-century bishop reflects on his faith and reveals his sins

Written in 397 A.D., St. Augustine's classic, Confessions, reveals the innermost thoughts and struggles of a soul converting from selfishness and pleasure-seeking to a life of love for God. Augustine of Hippo (345-430 A.D.) was born in North Africa to a devoutly Christian mother and pagan father. Of Latin stock, Augustine was given Christian instruction but waited until later in life to be baptized. Augustine took a mistress who bore him a son before he was eighteen. Augustine's sexual appetite drove him to seek pleasure where he could find it, but it also plagued his consience. His hunger for religious things led him through many of the belief systems of the day, including Manichaeism and Neoplatonism. Augustine finally turned to God in 386 A.D. when he heard a child say, "take, read" a copy of Paul's letter to the Romans. Upon his conversion to Christianity, Augustine became a prodigious writer, with his writings standing second only to the apostle Paul in their impact on the church. He died as Bishop of Hippo in North Africa. Confessions is the autobiography of Augustine of Hippo, a moving and profound record of a human soul and its struggles. The most widely read of all his works, it not only tells the story of Augustine's struggle in the faith, but also his love for the Master. Confessions speaks to the heart of humanity about human weakness, human frailty, human depravity, and the human need for a holy God. This classic is an exercise in self-knowledge and true humility in the atmosphere of grace and reconciliation. Book jacket.

The Confessions of Saint Augustine is considered one of the greatest Christian classics of all time. It is an extended poetic, passionate, intimate prayer that Augustine wrote as an autobiography sometime after his conversion, to confess his sins and proclaim God's goodness. Just as his first hearers were captivated by his powerful conversion story, so also have many millions been over the following sixteen centuries. His experience of God speaks to us across time with little need of transpositions. This acclaimed new translation by Sister Maria Boulding, O.S.B., masterfully captures his experience, and is written in an elegant and flowing style. Her beautiful contemporary translation of the ancient Confessions makes the classic work more accessible to modern readers. Her translation combines the linguistic accuracy demanded by 4th-century Latin with the poetic power aimed at by Augustine, not as discernable in previous translations.

George Carneal, author of "From Queer to Christ," grew up in the '70s, raised by a Southern Baptist minister in the ultra-conservative Bible Belt. For years he struggled with his Christian faith and a same-sex attraction. George shares his painful journey through a queer culture fantasyland filled with drag queens, drugs, and dangerous situations, a secular world at odds with homosexuality, in addition to a religious world that is hostile to homosexuals before discovering healing, joy, and peace in Christ. Perhaps sharing his journey through the eyes, and mind, of a confused child dealing with a same-sex attraction will give some insight into the pain and difficulty of navigating these two worlds. George would eventually spend 25 years immersed in the homosexual lifestyle (mostly in the Los Angeles club scene) and shares the pitfalls of that life. His story is not about glamorizing a life he once lived. This is merely his journey and what he learned along the way. Deliverance from that bondage is possible. There is hope in Christ! George is a frequent speaker at churches and conferences, has appeared on numerous television and radio broadcasts, as well as contributing quotes to online articles for LifeSite News, Christian Life Magazine, Tennessee Conservative News, and The Christian Post. For more information, please visit: http://www.georgecarneal.com

Henry Chadwick, an eminent scholar of early Christianity, has given us the first new English translation in thirty years of Augustine's The Confessions. We witness the future saint's fascination with astrology and with the Manichees, and then follow him through scepticism and disillusion with pagan myths until he finally reaches Christian faith. There are brilliant philosophical musings about Platonism and the nature of God, and touching portraits of Augustine's beloved mother, of St. Ambrose of Milan, and of other early Christians like Victorinus, who gave up a distinguished career as a rhetorician to adopt the orthodox faith. To make The Confessions accessible to contemporary readers, Chadwick provides the most complete and informative notes of any recent translation, and includes an introduction to establish the context.

Recalls crucial events in the author's life, including his origins in rural Algeria, his lavish lifestyle in Milan, his struggle with sexual desires, his eventual renunciation of secular ambitions and marriage, and the recovery of his Catholic faith.

Most theology students realize Augustine is tremendously influential on the Christian tradition as a whole, but they generally lack real knowledge of his writings. This volume introduces Augustine's theology through seven of his most important works. Matthew Levering begins with a discussion of Augustine's life and times and then provides a full survey of the argument of each work with bibliographical references for those who wish to go further. Written in clear, accessible language, this book offers an essential introduction to major works of Augustine that all students of theology--and their professors!--need to know.

You’ve heard his name—now read his classic spiritual autobiography. Here is Saint Augustine’s Confessions, an important and powerful book abridged and updated for today’s reader and presented in a deluxe, leather-like binding. Written some sixteen hundred years ago, this Christian classic still speaks to readers, addressing concerns that trouble the human heart today just as they did in the fourth and fifth centuries. Confessions gives an account of God’s grace in Augustine’s life—as well as his personal regret over the wickedness of his pre-Christian days. It’s a powerful introduction to a giant of the faith, and an encouraging story of God’s power to change people.

Augustine's vision at Ostia is one of the most influential accounts of mystical experience in the Western tradition, and a subject of persistent interest to Christians, philosophers and historians. This book explores Augustine's account of his experience as set down in the Confessions and considers his mysticism in relation to his classical Platonist philosophy. John Peter Kenney argues that while the Christian contemplative mysticism created by Augustine is in many ways founded on Platonic thought, Platonism ultimately fails Augustine in that it cannot retain the truths that it anticipates. The Confessions offer a response to this impasse by generating two critical ideas in medieval and modern religious thought: firstly, the conception of contemplation as a purely epistemic event, in contrast to classical Platonism; secondly, the tenet that salvation is absolutely distinct from enlightenment.