Lift Up Your Hearts

John Burnaby (BFr 1905) was one of the greatest interpreters of S. Augustine of Hippo, himself one of the greatest of Christian Theologians. Here, from his great book on Augustine, Amor Dei, is his explanation of the need of the Christian to seek forgiveness daily.

The Hulsean Lectures for 1938

Pelagius and Caelestus were rigorist monks who believed that despair of perfection makes the best excuse for laxity, and that the moral fibre of the average Christian can only be kept sound if he is assured of his freedom to avoid sin 'if he will.' To them Augustine replied that if despair is Scylla, presumption is Charybdis, and that the only way to escape both is to recognise that we are not born free but have to achieve freedom: the only safe rule is 'Make neither your own self righteouness a safe-conduct to heaven nor of God's mercy a safe-conduct to sin.' 'So long as we live our perfection is humility.' Augustine was convinced that our state of moral imperfection serves the purposes of God as a constant warning against pride. The worst danger that besets man, placed as he is but a little lower than the angels, is the worship of himself; and there can be no protection from this danger but the daily need to pray "forgive us our trespasses."