Feast Day: June 15th
The Life of Saint Augustine: Finding all at once in the Faith of Christ everything for which he had been searching elsewhere, and embracing all of the Dogmas of Christianity, he hastened to wash away the filth of his former sins through the laver of regeneration…
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Snippet of a Sermon: Saint Augustine and the Holy Trinity
Prayers
Apolytikion – Tone 3: Thou didst prove to be a radiant vessel of the Divine Spirit and an expounder of the City of God, O Blessed Augustine; and thou didst minister piously unto the Saviour, as a wise and God-inspired Hierarch. O Holy Father, entreat Christ God that He grant us great Mercy.
Kontakion – Tone 4: Having acquired the radiance of wisdom, thou didst prove to be a Divine instrument of piety, O Hierarch Augustine, thou favourite of Christ. As an initiate of Godly love, raise up on the wings of Divine longing us who cry unto thee: Rejoice, O God-inspired Father.
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A Prayer by Saint Augustine: “Watch, O Lord, with those who wake, or watch or weep tonight, and give Your Angels charge over those who sleep. Tend Your sick ones, O Lord Jesus Christ; rest Your weary ones; Bless Your dying ones; soothe Your suffering ones; pity Your afflicted ones; shield Your joyous ones; and all for Your Love’s sake. Amen.”
Saint Augustine is the son of Saint Monica
Saint Augustine wrote: “And now Thou didst ‘stretch forth Thy hand from above’ and didst draw up my Soul out of that profound darkness [of Manicheism] because my mother, Thy faithful one, wept to Thee on my behalf more than mothers are accustomed to weep for the bodily deaths of their children. For by the light of the faith and spirit which she received from Thee, she saw that I was dead. And Thou didst hear her, O Lord, Thou didst hear her and despised not her tears when, pouring down, they watered the Earth under her eyes in every place where she Prayed. Thou didst truly hear her.”
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“To fall in love with God is the greatest romance; to seek Him the greatest adventure; to find Him, the greatest human achievement.”
“Hope has two beautiful daughters; their names are Anger and Courage. Anger at the way things are, and Courage to see that they do not remain as they are.”
“There is no Saint without a past, no sinner without a future.”
“God has promised forgiveness to your repentance, but He has not promised tomorrow to your procrastination.”
“In my deepest wound I saw Your Glory, and it dazzled me.”
“Patience is the companion of wisdom.”
“God is always trying to give good things to us, but our hands are too full to receive them.”
“I have read in Plato and Cicero sayings that are wise and very beautiful; but I have never read in either of them: Come unto Me all ye that labor and are heavy laden.”
“For what am I to myself without You, but a guide to my own downfall?”
“Pray as though everything depends on God. And work as if everything depends on you.”
“Take care of your body as if you were going to live forever; and take care of your Soul as if you were going to die tomorrow.”
“What Grace is meant to do is to help good people, not to escape their sufferings, but to bear them with a stout heart, with a fortitude that finds its strength in Faith.”
“God grants us not always what we ask so as to bestow something preferable.”
“Even the straws under my knees shout to distract me from Prayer.”
“He that becomes protector of sin shall surely become its prisoner.”
“Trust the past to God’s Mercy, the present to God’s Love, and the future to God’s Providence.”
“It was pride that changed Angels into devils; it is humility that makes men as Angels.”
“If you would attain to what you are not yet, you must always be displeased by what you are. For where you are pleased with yourself there you have remained. Keep adding, keep walking, keep advancing.”
“The bodies of irrational animals are bent toward the ground, whereas man was made to walk erect with his eyes on Heaven, as though to remind him to keep his thoughts on things above.”
“Lord Jesus, don’t let me lie when I say that I love You… and protect me, for today I could betray You.”
“Right is right even if no one is doing it; wrong is wrong even if everyone is doing it.”
“Narrow is the mansion of my Soul; enlarge Thou it, that Thou mayest enter in. It is ruinous; repair Thou it. It has that within which must offend Thine eyes; I confess and know it. But who shall cleanse it? or to whom should I cry, save Thee? Lord, cleanse me from my secret faults, and spare Thy servant from the power of the enemy. I believe, and therefore do I speak.”
“Do not abandon what You have begun in me, but go on to perfect all that remains unfinished.”
“For no one should consider anything his own, except perhaps a lie, since all truth is from Him who said, “I am the Truth.”
“Our whole business therefore in this life is to restore to health the eye of the heart whereby God may be seen.”
“O mortals, how long will you be heavy-hearted? Life has come down to you, and are you reluctant to ascend and live? But what room is there for you to ascend, you with your high-flown ways and lofty talk? Come down, that you may ascend, ascend even to God…”
“Habits, if not resisted, soon become necessity.”
“Prayer is the key that opens Heaven; the favours we ask descend upon us the very instant our Prayers ascend to God.”
“This is the very perfection of a man, to find out his own imperfections.”
“You know how stupid and weak I am: teach me and heal me.”
“God had one Son on Earth without sin, but never one without suffering.”
“Thus I remained to myself an unhappy lodging where I could neither stay nor leave. For where could my heart fly from my heart? Where could I fly from my own self?”
“We are Christians, and strangers on Earth. Let none of us be frightened; our native land is not in this world.”
“Don’t you believe that there is in man a deep so profound as to be hidden even to him in whom it is?”
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“You have made us for Yourself, O Lord, and our hearts are restless until they rest in You.”
“God provides the wind, man must raise the sail.”
“Late have I loved You, beauty so old and so new: late have I loved You. And see, You were within and I was in the external world and sought You there, and in my unlovely state I plunged into those lovely created things which You made. You were with me, and I was not with You. The lovely things kept me far from You, though if they did not have their existence in You, they had no existence at all. You called and cried out loud and shattered my deafness. You were radiant and resplendent, You put to flight my blindness. You were fragrant, and I drew in my breath and now pant after You. I tasted You, and I feel but hunger and thirst for You. You touched me, and I am set on fire to attain the Peace which is Yours.”
“You never go away from us, yet we have difficulty in returning to You. Come, Lord, stir us up and call us back. Kindle and seize us. Be our fire and our sweetness. Let us love. Let us run.”
“Oh, God, to know You is life. To serve You is freedom. To praise You is the Soul’s joy and delight. Guard me with the power of Your Grace here and in all places. Now and at all times, forever. Amen.”
“I held my heart back from positively accepting anything, since I was afraid of another fall, and in this condition of suspense I was being all the more killed.”
“Do you wish to rise? Begin by descending. You plan a tower that will pierce the clouds? Lay first the foundation of humility.”
“A Christian should be an Alleluia from head to foot”
“Sin is looking for the right thing in the wrong place.”
“He who denies the existence of God, has some reason for wishing that God did not exist.”
“O Lord my God, tell me what You are to me. Say to my Soul, ‘I am your Salvation.’ Say it so that I can hear it. My heart is listening, Lord; open the ears of my heart and say to my Soul, ‘I am your Salvation.’ Let me run toward this Voice and seize hold of You. Do not hide Your face from me: let me die so that I may see it, for not to see it would be death to me indeed.”
“The happy life is this – to rejoice to Thee, in Thee, and for Thee.”
“When I come to be united to Thee with all my being, then there will be no more pain and toil for me, and my life shall be a real life, being wholly filled by Thee.”
“His knowledge is not like ours, which has three tenses: present, past, and future. God’s knowledge has no change or variation.”
“For it is one thing to see the Land of Peace from a wooded ridge, and yet another to walk the road that leads to it.”
“He who falls, falls by his own will; and he who stands, stands by God’s Will.”
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“The Holy Scriptures are our letters from home.”
“If you believe what you like in the Gospel, and reject what you don’t like, it is not the Gospel you believe, but yourself.”
“Understanding is the reward of Faith. Therefore, seek not to understand that you may believe, but believe that you may understand.”
“The Bible was composed in such a way that as beginners mature, its meaning grows with them.”
“We made bad use of immortality, and so ended up dying; Christ made good use of mortality, so that we might end up living.”
“Man’s Maker was made Man that He, Ruler of the stars, might nurse at His mother’s breast; that the Bread might hunger, the Fountain thirst, the Light sleep, the Way be tired on its journey; that Truth might be accused of false witnesses, the Teacher be beaten with whips, the Foundation be suspended on wood; that Strength might grow weak; that the Healer might be wounded; that Life might die.”
“Bad times, hard times, this is what people keep saying; but let us live well, and times shall be good. We are the times: Such as we are, such are the times.”
“We speak, but it is God Who teaches.”
“Miracles are not contrary to nature but only contrary to what we know about nature.”
“He cannot have God for his Father who will not have the Church for his mother.”
“So anyone who thinks that he has understood the divine scriptures or any part of them, but cannot by his understanding build up this double love of God and neighbour, has not yet succeeded in understanding them.”
“He who loves the coming of the Lord is not he who affirms that it is far off, nor is it he who says it is near, but rather he who, whether it be far off or near, awaits it with sincere faith, steadfast hope, and fervent love.”
“God judged it better to bring good out of evil than to permit no evil to exist.”
“If God had designed woman as man’s master, He would have taken her from his head; if as his slave, He would have taken her from his feet; but as He designed her for his companion and equal, He took her from his side.”
“Anyone who does not love Him Who made man has not learned to love man aright.”
“Run to and fro everywhere, holy fires, beautiful fires; for you are the light of the world, nor are you put under a bushel. He whom you cleave unto is exalted, and has exalted you. Run to and fro, and be known unto all nations.”
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“The measure of love is to love without measure.”
“What does love look like? It has the hands to help others. It has the feet to hasten to the poor and needy. It has eyes to see misery and want. It has the ears to hear the sighs and sorrows of men. That is what love looks like.”
“Since you cannot do good to all, you are to pay special attention to those who, by accidents of time, or place, or circumstance, are brought into closer connection with you.”
“Love is the beauty of the Soul.”
“If you keep silent, keep silent by love: if you speak, speak by love; if you correct, correct by love; if you pardon, pardon by love; let love be rooted in you, and from the root nothing but good can grow. Love and do what you will. Love endures in adversity, is moderate in prosperity; brave under harsh sufferings, cheerful in good works; utterly reliable in temptation, utterly open-handed in hospitality; as happy as can be among true brothers and sisters, as patient as you can get among the false one’s.
The soul of the scriptures, the force of prophecy, the saving power of the sacraments, the fruit of faith, the wealth of the poor, the life of the dying. Love is all.”
“Since God is the Highest Good, He would not allow any evil to exist in His works unless His Omnipotence and Goodness were such as to bring good even out of evil.”
“It is not that we keep His Commandments first and that then He loves but that He loves us and then we keep His Commandments. This is that Grace which is revealed to the humble but hidden from the proud.”
“Yet we must say something when those who say the most are saying nothing.”
“Love is ever new because it never groweth old.”
“There can only be two basic loves… the love of God unto the forgetfulness of self, or the love of self unto the forgetfulness and denial of God.”
“Christ is not valued at all, unless He is valued above all.”
“… the Earthly city glories in itself, the Heavenly City Glories in the Lord.”
“…It is no less impossible for us not to taste as bitter the death of those whose life for us was such a source of sweetness.”
“Love and say it with your life.”
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Quotes
“The world is a book and those who do not travel read only one page.”
“And men go abroad to admire the heights of mountains, the mighty waves of the sea, the broad tides of rivers, the compass of the ocean, and the circuits of the stars, yet pass over the mystery of themselves without a thought.”
“The punishment of every disordered mind is its own disorder.”
“The truth is like a lion; you don’t have to defend it. Let it loose; it will defend itself.”
“In order to discover the character of people we have only to observe what they love.”
“The mind commands the body and is instantly obeyed. The mind commands itself and meets resistance.”
“Faith is to believe what you do not yet see; the reward for this Faith is to see what you believe.”
“Some people, in order to discover God, read books. But there is a great book: the very appearance of created things. Look above you! Look below you! Read it. God, Whom you want to discover, never wrote that book with ink. Instead, He set before your eyes the things that He had made. Can you ask for a louder voice than that?”
“Love begins with a smile, grows with a kiss, and ends with a teardrop.”
“How can the past and future be, when the past no longer is, and the future is not yet? As for the present, if it were always present and never moved on to become the past, it would not be time, but Eternity.”
“Complete abstinence is easier than perfect moderation.”
“Once for all, then, a short precept is given thee: Love, and do what thou wilt: whether thou hold thy peace, through love hold thy peace; whether thou cry out, through love cry out; whether thou correct, through love correct; whether thou spare, through love do thou spare: let the root of love be within, of this root can nothing spring but what is good.”
“If you understood Him, it would not be God.”
“I was in misery, and misery is the state of every Soul overcome by friendship with mortal things and lacerated when they are lost. Then the Soul becomes aware of the misery which is its actual condition even before it loses them.”
“Thus, a good man, though a slave, is free; but a wicked man, though a king, is a slave. For he serves, not one man alone, but what is worse, as many masters as he has vices.”
“You are my Lord, because You have no need of my goodness.”
“Where your pleasure is, there is your treasure: where your treasure, there your heart; where your heart, there your happiness”
“Humility must accompany all our actions, must be with us everywhere; for as soon as we glory in our good works they are of no further value to our advancement in virtue. ”
“No one knows what he himself is made of, except his own spirit within him, yet there is still some part of him which remains hidden even from his own spirit; but You, Lord, know everything about a human being because You have made him… Let me, then, confess what I know about myself, and confess too what I do not know, because what I know of myself I know only because You shed light on me, and what I do not know I shall remain ignorant about until my darkness becomes like bright noon before Your face.”
“I look forward, not to what lies ahead of me in this life and will surely pass away, but to my eternal goal. I am intent upon this one purpose, not distracted by other aims, and with this goal in view I press on, eager for the prize, God’s heavenly summons. Then I shall listen to the sound of Your praises and gaze at Your beauty ever present, never future, never past. But now my years are but sighs. You, O Lord, are my only solace. You, my Father, are eternal. But I am divided between time gone by and time to come, and its course is a mystery to me. My thoughts, the intimate life of my Soul, are torn this way and that in the havoc of change. And so it will be until I am purified and melted by the fire of Your love and fused into one with You.”
“Does God proclaim Himself in the wonders of creation? No. All things proclaim Him, all things speak. Their beauty is the voice by which they announce God, by which they sing, “It is you who made me beautiful, not me myself but you.”
“Learn to dance, so when you get to Heaven the Angels know what to do with you.”
“He loves Thee too little, who loves anything together with Thee, which he loves not for Thy sake.”
“Give me Yourself, O my God, give Yourself back to me. Lo, I love You, but if my love is too mean, let me love more passionately. I cannot gauge my love, nor know how far it fails, how much more love I need for my life to set its course straight into Your arms, never swerving until hidden in the covert of Your face. This alone I know, that without You all to me is misery, woe outside myself and woe within, and all wealth but penury, if it is not my God.”
“There are wolves within, and there are sheep without.”
“For a sentence is not complete unless each word, once its syllables have been pronounced, gives way to make room for the next… They are set up on the course of their existence, and the faster they climb towards its zenith, the more they hasten towards the point where they exist no more.”
“How high a price we pay for the burden of habit! I am fitted for life here where I do not want to be, I want to live there but am unfit for it, and on both counts I am miserable.”
“Your best servant is the person who does not attend so much to hearing what he himself wants as to willing what he has heard from you.”
“Cantare amantis est … Singing belongs to one who loves.” (s. 336, 1 – PL 38, 1472).”
“But what do I love when I love my God? Not the sweet melody of harmony and song; not the fragrance of flowers, perfumes, and spices; not manna or honey; not limbs such as the body delights to embrace. It is not these that I love when I love my God. And yet, when I love Him, it is true that I love a light of a certain kind, a voice, a perfume, a food, an embrace; but they are of the kind that I love in my inner self, when my soul is bathed in light that is not bound by space; when it listens to sound that never dies away; when it breathes fragrance that is not borne away on the wind; when it tastes food that is never consumed by the eating; when it clings to an embrace from which it is not severed by fulfillment of desire. This is what I love when I love my God.”
“I count myself one of the number of those who write as they learn and learn as they write.”