In my Philosophy class we are just starting a new reading section on St. Augustine's Confessions. As told by my Professor, Father Thomas Regan SJ, it is "one of the greatest books to ever be written!" So far I am enjoying the themes and topics that St. Augustine presents. So I just wanted to share a few of them in this post.
St. Augustine wrote this book with the main goal of challenging the reader to be an authentic human being and be true to who we are. The book is a story of his life begins when he was a young 19 year old boy and makes promises that he will get his act together.
St. Augustine became a great student and was excellent at rhetoric (speaking and debating). He was a rich and famous lawyer. He was so good that he could send the innocent to jail and the guilty free. He had everything that he could ever want, girls, money and fame. When he woke up one morning and looked in the mirror, he realized that he had totally forgotten about his goals that he had set for himself back when he was 19. Augustine realizes that he has more money that he knows what to do with, he doesn't really know what happiness is and he has no clue what true love is.
Augustine's Confessions is his story about his past search for happiness and how he came to find the happiness in God, that he always wanted. This book is an excellent story for all college students to read, for one it talks about learning and growth. It explains struggles that we all have and the genuine search for happiness that many end up searching for in all the wrong places.
As young adults, I feel that it is so easy to be affected by the environments that the world sets up for us. As a result, we forget to be authentic human beings. This is an excellent book to relate to and will help people become who they really want to be. It reminds that only in God can we find the true happiness that we long for.
