as intrinsically evil and unclean. It is interesting to note that precisely what kind of food they gave
114 SAINT A UG USTINE - SERMONS
These, brothers and sisters, are the things you ought to attend to by continuous reflection, even if I didn't remind you of them. So since my voice, put at the service of so many divine testimonies, is being assisted by the celebration of this particular day,121 don't think I need be afraid that any of you will ignore what I say, or rather what the Lord of us all says through me. But I can rather hope instead that his flock will recognize that what has been said comes from him, and will listen to him, in order effectively to be listened to.
NOTES
1. Definitely later, I would say, than Sermon 207, probably earlier than 205 and 206; sometime, then, around 410-412. Again, almost certainly delivered in his own church of Hippo Regius.
2. It is rather surprising to hear him refer to his own voice as a trumpet call. He frequently complains of being rather weak of voice. He must have been in unusually good health and vigor at the time.
3. Of slavery; there is an allusion to Is 58:4. Perhaps the sermon was being preached at the country estate or villa of some wealthy people, and the owner and his family and neighboring gentry were being principally addressed. I wonder if such remarks were ever included in sermons in the antebellum Southern States of America, or in European colonies in the Caribbean before emanci¬ pation.
4. See 1 Cor 9:27.
5. Possibly referring to animals sacrificed to idols. 6. See Nm 11:5.33-34. 7. See Gn 25:29-34.
8. They are being warned, I think, against a kind of Manichean rejection of meat in particular as intrinsically evil and unclean. It is interesting to note that precisely what kind of food they gave up for Lent was left to their personal decision, and not fixed by custom and Church law.
9. See 1 Cor 7:5.
10. See Lk 23:34.
11. See Eccl 11:10.
12. Presumably the first Sunday of Lent.