Augustine, St, of Hippo

Augustine, St, of Hippo (354–430), Bp. of Hippo Regius (modern Annaba, on the coast of Algeria). Through his Christian mother ( St Monica) he was made a catechumen in infancy. In adolescence he lost his faith, and at the age of 17 he took a concubine, with whom he lived for 15 years. About 374 he adopted Manichaeism, which retained his loose allegiance as he passed through successive teaching posts at Carthage, Rome, and Milan. There various factors contributed to a religious crisis and in 387 he was baptized by St Ambrose. He returned to Africa in 388 and established an ascetic lay community at Thagaste. In 391, on a visit to Hippo, he was unwillingly ordained priest. Probably in the summer of 395 he became co-adjutor bishop and was in sole charge after Valerian's death soon afterwards.

Augustine's consecration as bishop was controversial, not least on account of his Manichaean past, and in the next three years he wrote his deeply anti-Manichaean Confessions (q.v.). His opposition to Donatism helped to win the confidence of the Catholic community. He invited Donatist bishops to debate the central issue of unity versus holiness, and he sought to induce his colleagues to recognize the sacraments conferred by Donatists. To this end he developed the distinction between validity (q.v.) and efficacy.

Augustine wrote a vast body of works against Pelagius, who in 405 had been scandalized by a quotation from his Confessions which he felt destroyed human responsibility. Pelagius held that, while grace is needed to carry out God's commands, the agent of a moral action has a part to play. Augustine argued that without grace there could be no faith, no act of good will; the consequences of Adam's fall had made humanity corrupt and selfish; therefore the grace needed is more than external instruction and has to be the love of God poured into the passive heart, so that humanity is enabled to do right because it is then enjoyable. Nevertheless, though Baptism is the sacrament of the remission of sins both actual and ‘original’ (i.e. corporately transmitted from Adam), no believer attains perfection, being tied by the body's desires. The sexual instinct is never without some flaw of egotism, even if procreative marriage makes good use of it. That salvation is wholly by grace is the logic of predestination: by an eternal decree antecedent to merit God has shown His mercy in choosing a minority of souls who are granted the gift of perseverance.

Augustine's other main works include The City of God, which appeared in instalments between 416 and 422. It is a massive vindication of Christianity against pagan critics who held the sack of Rome in 410 was due to the abandonment of the old gods. The central theme of On the Trinity, written between 399 and 419, is that there is nothing irrational in the notion of being one and three, since being, knowing, and willing are all constitutive of human personality. His Tractates on St John's Gospel, his Sermons and Rule (on which see following entry) embody the heart of his religion: his yearning for God and his profound sense of the ecclesial community. Near the end of his life he composed a review of his writings (Retractationes), partly correcting and partly defending himself. His influence on subsequent W. theology has been immense. Feast day, 28 Aug.