/lit/ - Literature

>>13346019
I have had a religious experience in church yesterday. They played Bach's Mass in B minor, and when it ended I felt shaken to the core, I was gasping for breath, my vision went blurry and my limbs went numb as I applauded, and at that moment I felt something clicked and took hold of me but could not make it out. I still cannot make sense of it, or tell how genuine or meaningful it was. Any resources for this? Was it real, was it "the moment"?

>>13010181
Read Augustine's Confessions. It's a very wonderful, moving story of personal conversion and an intimate relationship with God. You'll love it. You might also check out some of the lives of the saints, like Saint Athanasius' "The Life of Saint Anthony." The lives of the saints are incredibly inspiring because they're ordinary men and women who became extraordinary due to their faith in Christ.

Be warned, the current modern Mass (the Novus Ordo) can be done very badly and may put you off the Faith. It can be done very well, but it can also be done very badly, and seems to be done badly more often than not. When you want to attend Mass, try to find a parish that has a "reverent" Novus Ordo, or on the other hand a parish that offers the Latin Mass. They're more common than they used to be.

Go read the Confessions and try to tell me we've changed at all.

Read the Confessions first, then you can read the City of God. That's about all there is to it. All of his writing is good, and along with Aquinas he forms the foundation of Catholic theology and the teachings of the Church.

Numbers are real. The Forms are real. Realism or die, there is no other choice unless you want to live in a screaming void.

>>11237176
>>11238435
>virtue is good
>but humans are inherently sinful

Have I got a writer for you.

>>10882482
You made the mistake of assuming that something other than Christ would make you happy. Don't worry, it happens to all of us.

Remember, /lit/: Augustine was once a complete degenerate. He held heretical beliefs and also had repeated sexual relations outside of marriage, even fathering a child outside of wedlock. Yet in the end, he became so devoted to Jesus Christ that he's regarded as among the greatest of saints, and his writings have provided immense wisdom to Christians throughout the centuries.

So, it's never too late to turn your life around.

>>10175160
I know this feel very well, Anon. As I've grown older I've grown harsher and more exacting. It feels more and more inescapable that God is so transcendent and magnificent that the only logical thing to do is bow before him, and try to follow his commands, those commands he administers through his instrument on earth, which is the Church.

At the same time, >>10175196 is very correct. God's mercy isn't a license for all to do as they please. God's mercy doesn't mean you can do whatever you want. But God's mercy is a light in the darkness, and those who follow the light really and truly will indeed receive absolution. And, moreover, God's mercy is a light that shines upon those of us who have a tendency to be harsh and cruel, and in this case it's a clarifying light. It's a reminder that however much we try, and however much we strive to be saintly, we, too, are sinners, and we, too, need absolution. And if WE need God's mercy, how much more does everyone else need God's mercy?

So if we are striving to be just and holy, we should be vessels of God's mercy. Not a false mercy--not a mercy that gives license--but a mercy that calls to repentance. We should be merciful so that sinners can become saints.

"You made us for yourself, O Lord, and our hearts are restless until they rest in you."

It's the feast day of /lit/'s favorite saint!

>>9879724
It IS a place, at least it's a realm beyond this life. But it just so happens to be the place where one is separated from God's love, so in that regard both East and West are correct. None of the torments of Hell--the flames, the demons, the darkness--are anything compared to that severing. In fact, pious tradition holds that Purgatory also has flames, but they are borne with joy because the souls in them know Heaven awaits.

>>9862557
>tfw you pray to St. Augustine for his intercession to help you both avoid and resist temptation

>>9595996
You are now ready to begin the next stage of your ascension. Go read Augustine's Confessions, and when you're done with that read Moby-Dick.

>Protestants
>good philosophers

My man from Hippo blows Captain Kierk out of the water.

No, but Schoppy did have the good sense to admire the actual greatest philosopher.

Augustine is one of the greatest thinkers in Western history. We inherit so much from him in the modern world, not the least because it is through him that Christianity fully absorbed Platonic thought.

But he's also a passionate, thoughtful man, a man who clearly struggles with sin and doubt, but who nevertheless remains faithful to God and is rewarded with the touch of the divine. He is an inspiration to everyone who's ever questioned themselves.

Read everything he's written.

Honestly, though, if you want a "convincing" book of conversion, read the Confessions by Augustine.

There is a man who is a mighty soul indeed, a great human being humbled before God. You should read his account. He's a bit more great and terrible a man than Lewis.

>>8938243
Saints obey the teachings of Christ, and by extension, the teachings of the Church. They follow Christ to whatever end, even if it means inconvenience, imprisonment, or death.

The bit in the Confessions where Augustine talks about his mother's death got my eyes to sting.

"Our hearts are restless, Lord, until they rest in thee."

Isn't Augustine, ultimately, Nietzsche's natural foil? Particularly when you take the Confessions into account. Here is a man that fully embraced what you might call his Dionysian elements, his inner strength and will... and he tossed it all away, and became perhaps the purest example of Christian slave morality. And it made him happy.

To top it off, he was a particular favorite of Schopenhauer, who of course was a huge part of Nietzsche's development as a philosopher. And I believe at one point Nietzsche even comments disparagingly about him in a letter.

And of course it goes without saying that their philosophical projects are diametrically opposed.