Presented in partnership with Augustinian Resemblances, a research project in the Faculty of Theology & Religion at the University of Oxford.
This conference will bring together patrologists, historians and systematic theologians to study both this most momentous of the Latin Fathers, and his long-contested and ever-developing reception.
Overview
Few thinkers have had so great an influence on the development of Christian theology and the Catholic tradition as St Augustine of Hippo. His significance in the Latin West is unrivalled.
His prolific preaching and commentary on Sacred Scripture is supplemented by his explicit and sustained theorising on the exegete’s task and methods. His defences of Nicene trinitarianism and Catholic ecclesiology established a Western gold standard. His distinctive models of sin and grace, of sacramentology and signification, and of election and ecclesial unity provided both the framework and the fault-lines for more than a thousand years of theological reasoning. Thanks to his voluminous correspondence and his carefully curated Confessions we have a richer appreciation of his biography and intellectual development than virtually any other figure from Late Antiquity. Indeed, thanks to the work of Peter Brown, St Augustine seems almost to embody that historical period.
Speakers will explore his life and historical context, his theology and Scriptural interpretation, and the long story of how subsequent theologians and thinkers have found in the Bishop of Hippo a model for emulation, an authority to follow, and a conversation partner with and through whom to reason.
As usual at Pusey House, this conference will bring together research from both the Academy and the Church, and will be ecumenical in both composition and outlook.
In particular, and following on from last year’s successful Nicaea conference, there will be a particular emphasis on sharing the very best contemporary research with current undergraduate and postgraduate students from Oxford and further afield, and with those engaged in Christian ministry.
Speakers
Dr David Bennett (Wycliffe Hall, Oxford), The Judge Who Weeps: Misericordia, Emotion, and Augustine's Christological Subversion of Classical Eudaimonia.
Dr Joshua Caminiti (Lincoln College, Oxford), Almost, but not quite: A.H. Armstrong on Augustine.
Professor Phillip Cary (Eastern University), Ecclesial Sacraments: The Church as Res Sacramenti in Augustine.
Professor Anthony Dupont (KU Leuven), Tolle Lege Imagined: Augustine’s Conversion Represented Throughout the Ages.
Professor Mark Edwards (Christ Church, Oxford), Silence and Forgetting in Augustine.
The Rev'd Dr Carolyn Hammond (Gonville & Caius, Cambridge), ‘After the gospel, no need for research’: Augustine Teaching Christianity.
Canon Professor Carol Harrison (Christ Church, Oxford), Augustine and the enduring bond of relationship.
The Rev'd Professor Joshua Hordern (Harris Manchester College, Oxford), The attraction of Christians to an English national identity: An Augustinian reflection on loyalty and hope.
Professor Fr Oskari Juurikkala (Santa Croce, Rome), Augustine's Other Book: Creation and How to Read It.
Professor Karla Pollmann (University of Tübingen), Augustine the Preacher: Christianizing Mass Communication?
Dr Jonathan Price (Pusey House & St Cross, Oxford), Augustine Against the Age of Identity?
Dr Marie-Ange Rakotoniaina (Fordham University), In Search of Lost Time: Finding the Sabbath Rest in the Sermons of Augustine.
Professor Susannah Ticciati (King's College, London), ‘Seek his face always’: De trinitate as unending search.
Tickets
Tickets are now available for purchase: £45 for the standard rate and £15 for students, ordinands, retired clergy, and for the unwaged. Tickets can be booked here: ticketsource.com/pusey-house
The conference will include a public lecture by Professor Karla Pollmann, President of the University of Tübingen, at 4pm on the afternoon of Wednesday 18th November:
"Augustine the Preacher: Christianizing Mass Communication?"
Abstract: Augustine was a professionally trained speaker and teacher of rhetoric. Already before his conversion he was well-known for his eloquence. Although after his conversion he was critical of his earlier career as a "worldly" speaker, he still acknowledged that rhetoric played an important function in helping to convey the Christian message about the salvation of the soul. He even wrote a treatise outlining core points of what a Christian rhetoric should look like, which contains – by ancient standards – some revolutionary points, in particular that grammatical mistakes were allowed for a preacher if it ensured the audience could follow the sermon’s content better. Around 800 of Augustine‘s sermons are extant today (out of many thousands he must have delivered), and new ones continue to be found.
This lecture aims at elucidating some of the rhetorical strategies and challenges Augustine had to master during his career and explores in which ways his homiletic activity correlates to modern notions of mass communication.
The keynote lecture will be followed by Evensong in the Pusey House Chapel at 5:30pm, to which all are welcome. The guest preacher will be The Rev'd Dr Joseph Hamilton, Rector of Domus Australia, Rome. The introit of Evensong will be 'Fecisti nos' by Philip Radcliffe sung by the Pusey House choir, which is a setting of the famous passage in Augustine's Confessions: Fecisti nos, Domine, ad Te, et inquietum est cor nostrum donec quiescat in Te (You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it rests in you).
St Augustine of Hippo: The Journey Inward
To help participants prepare for Receiving Augustine , Professor Phillip Cary will lead a study day on the life and work of St Augustine of Hippo (354–430 AD) on the Saturday before the conference.
As a bishop and foundational thinker of Western culture, Augustine’s impact is best understood through his definitive masterpiece, Confessions. This extraordinary work uniquely combines extended prayer, autobiography, spiritual journey, human fulfilment, and metaphysics.
Professor Phillip Cary is a renowned authority on Augustine's thought. He is Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at Eastern University and Former Scholar-in-Residence at the Templeton Honors College.
Please contact us to register if you are interested in attending: pusey.office@stx.ox.ac.uk
Details:
Date: Saturday 14th November.
Place: Ursell Room, Pusey House.
Timetable:
9.30am Tea and coffee served to welcome those attending.
10.00am First session.
Confessions 1:1–5 The Restless Heart and the Transcendent God
Confessions 3:7–6 In Love with Wisdom
11.00am Tea and coffee break.
11.30am Second session.
Confessions 4:4.7–11.16 What Grief Shows Us
12.30pm Lunch break for 90 minutes.
2.00pm Third session.
Confessions 3:12 Monica's Tears, part 1
Confessions 5.8–9 Monica's Tears, part 2
3.00pm Tea and coffee break.
3.30pm Fourth session.
Confessions 10:27 “Late Have I Love You”
Confessions 13:9 “My Love is My Weight”
4.30pm End of study day.
The passages that will be covered in the Study Day are provided in this handout which will be available to collect on the day.
Any questions or queries about the conference should be sent to mehmet.ciftci@stx.ox.ac.uk
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