Page 82 - EMCAPP-Journal No. 24

This fantasy is not only a theological error, it robs him of the
consola�on of friendship, trapping him as it does in a fantasy
world of his own crea�on. “If I tried to lodge my soul in that,
hoping that it might rest there, it would slip through that
insubstan�al thing” compounding his suffering. In his
disappointment he “falls back again” on himself, remaining
stuck in “an unhappy place where I could not live, but from
which I could not escape.” His grief makes clear to Augus�ne
that what he seeks to avoid is not emo�onal pain, real though
it is, but for his own life with its disordered loves that makes
restora�on impossible and further pain unavoidable. “Whither
could my heart flee to escape itself? Where could I go and leave
myself behind? Was there any place of refuge where I would
not be followed by my own self?” (IV.7.12)
There is no where he can go to escape himself. And “Yet flee I
did from my na�ve land, for my eyes were less inclined to look
for him where they had not been wont to see him before. So I
le� Thagaste and came to Carthage” (IV.7.12) Though his
mo�ves for the journey are mixed it is in Carthage, or rather in
the company of friends there that embrace him, that Augus�ne
overcomes his grief.

At first, this “company” is for Augus�ne just another
“subs�tute” for God and so “a gross fable and a long-sustained
lie.” But his willingness to accept the acceptance of company of
friends “who loved and knew their love returned, signs to be
read in smiles, words, glances and a thousand gracious
gestures,” becomes for him a source of renewal. It is here, in
this communion where “sparks kindled and our minds were
fused inseparably, out of many becoming one” (IV.8.13), that he
overcomes the grief’s paralysis.

For all the effort that Augus�ne exerts to know himself, it is
ul�mately his acceptance of the gi� of friendship that proves
healing. Thanks to his friends, Augus�ne, slowly comes to learn
to love God and so his friends in God and even his enemies “for
your sake” (IV.9.14). In response to our grief, Augus�ne offers
us a stern but kind word. We cannot lossen the grip of grief by
ourselves, we need help. Indeed, we need the one thing that
grief makes distateful and even painful; the company of friends.

References
Augus�ne of Hippo. (1997). The Confessions (M. Boulding O.S.B., Trans.). New
City Press.

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