August 28: devotion and prayers to Sant'Agostino
Saint Augustine was born in Africa in Tagaste, in Numidia - currently Souk-Ahras in Algeria - on 13 November 354 from a family of small landowners. He received a Christian education from his mother, but after reading Cicero's Hortensio he embraced philosophy by adhering to Manichaeism. The trip to Milan, the city where he met Saint Ambrose, dates back to 387. The meeting is important for Augustine's journey of faith: it is from Ambrose that he receives baptism. Later he returned to Africa with the desire to create a community of monks; after the death of his mother he goes to Hippo, where he is ordained a priest and bishop. His theological, mystical, philosophical and polemical works - the latter reflect the intense struggle that Augustine wages against heresies, to which he dedicates part of his life - are still being studied. For his thought, contained in texts such as "Confessions" or "City of God", Augustine deserved the title of Doctor of the Church. While Hippo was besieged by the Vandals, in 429 the saint fell seriously ill. He died on 28 August 430 at the age of 76. (Future)
PRAYER TO S. AUGUSTINE
For that most vivid consolation that you, O glorious Saint Augustine, brought to Saint Monica your mother and to the whole Church, when animated by the example of the Roman Victorinus and by the speeches now public, now deprived of the great Bishop of Milan, Saint Ambrose , and of St. Simplician and Alypius, finally resolved to convert, obtain for us all the grace to continually take advantage of the examples and advice of the virtuous, in order to bring to heaven as much joy with our future life as we have caused sadness with so many shortcomings of our past life. Glory
We who have followed Augustine wandering, must follow him penitent. Deh! may his example impel us to seek forgiveness and to cut off all the affections that cause our downfall. Glory
MAXIMUM. - Christian mothers, if you know how to cry and pray, the conversion of your Augustines will one day dry your tears again.
PRAYER TO S. AUGUSTINE
of Pope Paul VI
Augustine, is it not true that you are calling us back to the interior life? That life that our modern education, all projected on the outside world, lets languish, and almost makes us bored? We no longer know how to gather, we no longer know how to meditate, we no longer know how to pray.
If we then enter our spirit, we close ourselves inside, and we lose the sense of external reality; if we go outside, we lose the sense and the taste of the inner reality and of the truth, that only the window of the inner life discovers us. We no longer know how to establish the right relationship between immanence and transcendence; we no longer know how to find the path of truth and reality, because we have forgotten its starting point which is the interior life, and its point of arrival which is God.
Call us back, O Saint Augustine, to ourselves; teach us the value and the vastness of the inner kingdom; remind us of your words: «By means of my soul I will go up ..»; put your passion also in our souls: "Oh truth, oh truth, what deep sighs rose ... towards you from the depths of my soul!".
O Augustine, be us teachers of the interior life; grant that we recover ourselves in it, and that once we have re-entered the possession of our soul we can discover within it the reflection, the presence, the action of God, and that we are docile to the invitation of our true nature, more docile still to the mystery of his grace, we can reach wisdom, that is, with the thought the Truth, with the Truth the Love, with the Love the fullness of the Life that is God.
PRAYER TO S. AUGUSTINE
by Pope John Paul II
O great Augustine, our father and teacher, connoisseur of the luminous paths of God and also of the tortuous ways of men, we admire the wonders that divine Grace has worked in you, making you a passionate witness of truth and good, at the service of the brothers.
At the beginning of a new millennium marked by the cross of Christ, teach us to read history in the light of divine Providence, which guides events towards the definitive encounter with the Father. Orient us towards destinations of peace, nourishing in your heart your own yearning for those values on which it is possible to build, with the strength that comes from God, the "city" on a human scale.
The profound doctrine, which with loving and patient study you have drawn from the ever-living sources of Scripture, illuminate those who are today tempted by alienating mirages. Obtain the courage for them to embark on the path to that "inner man" in whom the One who alone can give peace to our restless heart is waiting.
Many of our contemporaries seem to have lost the hope of being able, among the many contrasting ideologies, to reach the truth, of which, however, their intimate retains the poignant nostalgia. It teaches them never to give up on research, in the certainty that, in the end, their effort will be rewarded by the fulfilling encounter with that supreme Truth which is the source of all created truth.
Finally, O Saint Augustine, also send us a spark of that ardent love for the Church, the Catholic mother of saints, who supported and animated the efforts of your long ministry. Grant that, walking together under the guidance of the legitimate Pastors, we reach the glory of the heavenly homeland, where, with all the Blesseds, we will be able to unite ourselves with the new canticle of the endless alleluia. Amen.
PRAYER TO S. AUGUSTINE
by M. Alessandra Macajone OSA
Augustine, our father and of all, a contemporary brother to all, you, a man of the sleepless inner search, who have well known the luminous paths of God and experienced the tortuous paths of men, made our life teacher and traveling companion. We are disoriented, lost, sick of inconsistency. Deceived every day by false and alienating goals, we too, like you, love in exchange for God, immense fables and infinite lies (cf. Conf. 4,8).
Father Agostino, come and gather us from our dispersions, come and lead us "home", put us on a pilgrimage to the inner depths of ourselves where, fortunately, the restlessness of our heart has no peace. We ask you as a gift for the courage to walk the way back to ourselves every day, to our inner man, where a Love beyond all expectations has been revealed to you, which was waiting for you in the heart and came to you right in the heart. meeting.
Father Agostino, you were a passionate singer of Truth, we seem to have lost the way; teach us never to be afraid of it, because its splendor is a reflection of the face of God. And with the Truth we will discover the beauty of every created thing and first of all of ourselves, the image and likeness of God, of which we have more and more poignant nostalgia.
Father Agostino, you sang the beauty and clarity of human nature, to whose divine origin we would like to return, in order to build a new society. Awaken in our arid society the charm of the pure heart that finally sees God; it reawakens the confidence and joy of true friendship. Finally, set us on a journey with you towards goals of peace, making our hearts burn with your passion for unity and harmony, so that we build a city of God where coexistence and a life more worthy of being lived are beautiful and holy. , for the glory of God and for the happiness of men. Amen.