For a period of nine years, from age eighteen to twenty-seven, I lived seduced and seducing, deceived and deceiving in various forms of unholy desires: openly, by teaching what they call liberal sciences; secretly, by adhering to a false religion. Here proud, there superstitious, everywhere vain! On the one hand I was striving after the emptiness of popular praise, down even to theatrical applause, poetic prizes and competitions for grassy garlands, the follies of theatrical shows and untempered lusts. On the other hand, I desired to be cleansed of these defilement by carrying food to those who were called Elect and Holy, out of which, in the laboratories of their stomachs they should forge for us angels and gods by whom we might be cleansed. I followed these things and practised them with my friends who were deceived by me and with me.

Let the arrogant mock me and such as have not been struck down by you. O my God; but I would still in your praise confess my own shame to you. Bear with me and give me grace. I pray to go over the wanderings of former years and to offer to you the sacrifice of thanksgiving. For without you, what am I to myself but a guide to my own downfall? Or at my best, what am I but an infant suckled on your milk and feeding on you, O Food that never perishes? But what sort of man is any man since he is but a man? Let the strong and mighty laugh at me. In my need and helplessness I will confess to you.

In those years I taught rhetoric and driven by an inordinate desire for wealth. I offered the art of speaking for sale. Yet you know, Lord, that I preferred honest scholars, as honesty goes, and that I taught them tricks without trickery, not to be used against the life of the guiltless, although sometimes in behalf of the life of the guilty. And from afar, O God, you saw me stumbling in that slippery path and amid much smoke sending out some sparks of faithfulness which I showed in my guidance of those who loved vanity and sought after falsehood. In truth I was their companion.

In those years I had a mistress, not a wife in lawful marriage but a woman whom I had met following my wayward passion, as void of understanding as I was. I remained faithful to her and experienced for myself what difference there is between the self-restraint of the marriage covenant made for the sake of raising a family and the bargain of a lustful love where children are born against their parents will, although, once born, they may constraint our love.

I remember also that when I had decided to enter a contest for a theatrical prize, a soothsayer asked me what I would give him to win. Detesting and abhorring such foul mysteries, I answered, "Though the wreath should be made of gold itself, I would not permit a fly to be killed to gain it". For he would have killed a certain living creature to sacrifice and by that means invite the devils to favour me.

I rejected this evil but not out of pure love for you, O God of my heart; for I did not know how to love you, not knowing how to conceive of anything beyond a material brightness. And does not a person sighting after such idle fictions commit fornication against you, trust in unreality and feed the wind? I would not have him sacrifice to devils for me but I was sacrificing to them myself by my superstition. What else is it to feed the wind but to feed the devils, that is, by our wanderings to become their pleasure and mockery?

Those imposters whom they call mathematicians, I consulted without scruple because they used no sacrifice and did not pray to any spirit for their divination. Yet true Christian piety consistently rejects and condemns them, too. For it is a good thing to confess to you and say, "Have mercy on me, heal my soul, for I have sinned against you," and not to abuse your mercy for a license to sin but to remember the Lord's words, Behold, you are made whole, sin no more, lest a worse thing come upon you. All this good advice these men strive to destroy , saying, "the cause of your sin is inevitably determined in heaven," and "This Venus did, or Saturn, or Mars", so that man, indeed, flesh and blood and proud corruption, may be blameless while the Creator and Ordainer of heaven and the stars is to bear the blame. And also is he but our God, the very Sweetness and Wellspring of righteousness who renders to every man according to his works who will not despise a broken and contrite heart?

In those days there was a wise.................

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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 -