The power of words over minds has long been recognised: Plato and Socrates worried about it and the great Roman orator Cicero believed those who excelled in it should lead the Roman Republic. Indeed, the art of rhetoric has been considered something akin to sorcery—the ability of eloquent people to manipulate wills has been the object of admiration and of fear. Today, the same power can be seen at work in consumer culture, with its relentless shaping of people’s desires, their ideas of happiness and even their identities – all for profit.
It is by and large the case that the Church has yet to awaken to the challenge of consumerism. Yet in the great fifth-century theologian of the West, Augustine of Hippo, she has a thinker who not only recognised the power of words over people but was willing to meet that worldly rhetoric head on with a new rhetoric directed towards salvation. Drawing upon his own long education in rhetoric, Augustine came to understand profoundly its underlying psychology, and to see clearly that in a fallen world of competing alternatives, heaven can be won or lost through the power of words.
To churches struggling to challenge both the excesses and the underlying potency of consumerism, Augustine offers a God whose Eloquent Wisdom can supersede all worldly rhetoric. By reading consumer culture through the lens of his rhetorical theology, Christians can be awakened to the true destiny of their restless hearts.
Mark Clavier is Vice-Principal and Charles Marriott Director of Pastoral Studies, St Stephens House, Oxford
To churches struggling to challenge both the excesses and the underlying potency of consumerism, Augustine offers a God whose Eloquent Wisdom can supersede all worldly rhetoric. By reading consumer culture through the lens of his rhetorical theology, Christians can be awakened to the true destiny of their restless hearts.
Mark Clavier is Vice-Principal and Charles Marriott Director of Pastoral Studies, St Stephens House, Oxford
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