4. Clement, Stromata, V1.9.78, quoted in Bouyer, Spirituality, p. 272. (continued)
INTRODUCTION
v We know that by turning everything to their good God cooperates with all those who love Him, with all those that he has called according to his purpose. They are the ones he chose specially long ago and intended to become the images of his Son, so that his Son might be the eldest of many brothers. He called those he intended for this; those he called he justified, and with those he justified he shared his glory.
Nothing therefore can come between us and the love of Christ, even if we are troubled or worried, or being persecuted, or lacking food or clothes, or being threatened or even attacked. As scripture promised: "For your sake we are being massacred daily, and reckoned as sheep for the slaughter." These are trials through which we triumph, by the power of him who loved us.
For I am certain of this: neither death nor life, no angel, no prince, nothing that exists, nothing still to come, not any power, or height or depth, nor any created thing, can ever come between us and the love of God made visible in Christ Jesus our Lord.>
It was clear to Paul and became gradually clear to Augustine that the spiritual life was that lived by Christ on earth, a life of truth and love that was rooted in the Trinity.
Augustinian spirituality centers on the Divine Trinity revealed in the New Testament and understood as far as possible by reflection on its image in the human soul—the memory, understanding, and will converted to God the Father in the light of the Word and under the influence of the Holy Spirit. Although the early Christians read about the Trinity in Scripture and could discover the Father, Son, and Spirit revealing themselves through their salvific actions, the piety of Christians tended to focus on
Father and Son, and up until the fourth century the word "'God" was generally used tg mean the "Father." Only in A.D. 325, under attack from the Arians, was the consubstantiality of the Son declared a dogma at Nicaea. After Athanasius, the theologian who did most to defend the dogma of the Trinity was Marius Victor-
5. Rom 8.