Augustine in His Own Words
will tell whether his life and his zeal for the faith of Christ prove worthy. . . .
(12) To judge the heart's hiddenness and to refuse to accept a voice's clarity: that's not for us to make recommendations on or decisions about. We recognize, you see, our Lord's merciful greed, everywhere seeking a lucrative return on his money. . . . Christ will be the one who exacts profits not only from this man here, but from all of us. Let us fulfill, therefore, our task as investors and not lay claim to the role of exacting profits. . . . You know what got shouted here, you know it: that "pagans should not be mayors," that "pagans should not rule over Christians." That's what was shouted. . . . Human beings were doing what they could, but Faustinus got minted by Christ as a brand-new banker. Therefore, brothers and sisters, keep the work of God in mind. . . . We all heard Faustinus's voice, out loud and with devotion: "I do not wish to be mayor, I want to be a Christian." Rejoice, exult, love him— more than you ever despised him. Recommend his work to Christ by your prayers. Show a faithful, pious, friendly spirit to an old man's first lessons in school. What difference is it that, as you see, he's already reached an elderly age? He may have come into the vineyard at the ninth hour, but he will receive equal pay (Mt 20:12–15).21
Delaying Baptism
Fourth and fifth-century bishops across the Empire used to complain about catechumens delaying baptism. In one of the Divjak letters, Augustine writes to a catechumen named Firmus. Firmus had asked Augustine to send him a copy of On the City of God after attending a public reading of Book 18. Augustine forwarded the massive text but demanded repayment, namely, that Firmus put in his name for baptism. Firmus offered various excuses, for example, that he had not received the grace yet (exactly the sort of excuse that Pelagius used to complain bitterly about and one reason that Pelagius would attack Augustine's theology of grace). Augustine, even with his radical theology of God's graced initiatives and of predestination, would hear nothing of Firmus's delays and argued that his outer exhortation was an external grace that echoed the grace of God's interior call. From Letter 2* (Divjak):
(3) I see that in one of your other letters you make excuses about why you have been putting off accepting the sacrament of rebirth and thus, in effect, throwing away the fruits of all those books [of On the City of God] you love.
21. S. 279.10–12 (MA 1:589–93); my trans. The text here is from s. Morin 1, not the Maurist edition of s. 279. Another time, Augustine brought up an ex-astrologer before the congregation and made a similar public appeal (en. Ps. 61.23); however, the man was not a pagan, but a one-time Christian who sought to be restored to communion and committed to doing public penance.