The first reason is metaphysical: charity is a love that leads the will to the possession of true values because it sees all things in their right order. It sees creatures for what they are, means to the possession of God. It uses them only as means and thus arrives successfully at the end, which is God. But cupidity is doomed from the start to frustration because it is based on a false system of values. It takes created things for ends in themselves, which they are not. The will that seeks rest in creatures for their own sake stops on the way to its true end, terminates in a value which does not exist, and thus frustrates all its deepest capacities for happiness and peace.
The second reason is psychological and moral. Those who love a supreme and finite good that cannot be diminished by being shared. Those who place their hopes on the possession of created and limited goods are doomed to conflict with one another and to everlasting fear of losing whatever they may have gained.
Hence the city that is united in charity will be the only one to possess true peace, because it is the only one that conforms to the true order of things, the order established by God. The city that is united merely by an alliance of temporal interests cannot promise itself more than a temporary cessation from hostilities and its order will never be anything but a makeshift.
St. Augustine has left us a famous illustration of the way the citizens of the heavenly city are united in their knowledge and love of God. At the beginning of his De Doctrina Christiana he calls to mind the audience in a Roman theater. He shows us the spectators, coming together, strangers, from different places, to sit and watch the play. Soon one of the actors begins to arouse the admiration of individuals. They like him and they begin to applaud. Then, finding their own enthusiasm reproduced in others, they "begin to love one another for the sake of him that they love." A bond is established; they begin to encourage one and another in applauding their favorite.
Anyone who has been to the opera in a large Italian city will appreciate St. Augustine's description. The enthusiasm spreads through the crowd, and a "society" is spontaneously generated by this common bond of love for a common object of contemplation. At the same time, those who do not share this admiration and love are, by that very fact, excluded and divided off into another, contrary society. So it is with the two cities of heaven and earth. Their two loves divide them beyond reconciliation. They are traveling in opposite and thus it is impossible that their roads should ever reach the same term.
Nevertheless, the fact that the two cities are opposed to one another does not mean that they cannot peacefully co-exist here on earth. It is not impossible that they should agree upon a modus vivendi. They can come to terms, and it is well that they should do so. The temporal advantage of worldly society is well served when the citizens of heaven still living in the world are protected by the temporal power. and although the Church as a whole can only profit by persecution, nevertheless temporal peace is a greater blessing, and one to be prayed and worked for, since it provides the normal condition under which most men can safely expect to work out their eternal destiny.
Was St. Augustine planning a temporal theocracy, a Holy Roman Empire in The City of God? It is abundantly clear that the City he described is the Kingdom of Christ which, as Jesus told Pilate, is "not of this world." Nevertheless, that does not mean that St. Augustine would necessarily have frowned upon a temporal theocracy. But it certainly entitles us to suppose that he would not have placed very high hopes in one.
The real value of this book................
Page 4
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Sunday, May 24, 2009
I have through years of reading, pondering, reflecting and contemplating, the 3 things that last; FAITH . HOPE . LOVE and I would like to made available my sharing from the many thinkers, authors, scholars and theologians whose ideas and thoughts I have borrowed. God be with them always. Amen!
I STILL HAVE MANY THINGS TO SAY TO YOU BUT THEY WOULD BE TOO MUCH FOR YOU NOW. BUT WHEN THE SPIRIT OF TRUTH COMES, HE WILL LEAD YOU TO THE COMPLETE TRUTH, SINCE HE WILL NOT BE SPEAKING AS FROM HIMSELF, BUT WILL SAY ONLY WHAT HE HAS LEARNT; AND HE WILL TELL YOU OF THE THINGS TO COME.
HE WILL GLORIFY ME, SINCE ALL HE TELLS YOU WILL BE TAKEN FROM WHAT IS MINE. EVERYTHING THE FATHER HAS IS MINE; THAT IS WHY I SAID: ALL HE TELLS YOU WILL BE TAKEN FROM WHAT IS MINE. - JOHN 16:12-15 -
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