St. Augustine: The First Catechetical Instruction
Overview
Written about the year AD 405, embodies both a manual for the catechist and a catechesis for the prospective catechumen.
Top Highlights
“Therefore, in the Old Testament the New is concealed, and in the New the Old is revealed.53” (Page 23)
“But often the eagerness of those who desire to hear me shows me that my discourse is not so dull as it seems to me. From the enjoyment, too, which they manifest I gather that they receive some benefit from it. And so I take great pains not to fail in offering this service, in which I see what is offered so well received by them. In like manner you also, from the very fact that those who are to be instructed in the faith are so often brought to you, ought to be convinced that your discourse is not so unsatisfactory to others as to yourself, and you ought not to account your efforts fruitless simply because you do not express so clearly as you wish the things which you perceive; since perhaps you cannot even perceive them as you desire.” (Page 16)
“Now this God does, granting an opportunity for repentance even to those who, He knows, will persist in their wickedness, in order to exercise and mold our patience with Himself as our pattern; that we may thereby know how greatly we ought to suffer the wicked with forbearance, since we do not know what manner of men they may afterwards become, seeing that He, from whom nothing of the future is hidden, spares them and suffers them to live.” (Pages 61–62)
“Indeed, people listen to us with much greater pleasure when we ourselves take pleasure in this same work of instruction. The thread of our discourse is affected by the very joy that we ourselves experience, and as a consequence is delivered more easily and received more gratefully.” (Page 17)
- Title: St. Augustine: The First Catechetical Instruction
- Authors: Augustine of Hippo, Joseph P. Christopher
- Series: Ancient Christian Writers
- Volume: 2
- Publisher: Newman Press
- Print Publication Date: 1947
- Logos Release Date: 2015
- Language: English
- Resources: 1
- Format: Digital › Logos Research Edition
- Subject: Catechetics › Early works to 1800
- ISBNs: 0809100479, 9780809100477
- Resource ID: LLS:STGSTNCTNSTRCTN
- Resource Type: Monograph
- Metadata Last Updated: 2024-03-25T20:57:36Z