One of the defining moments of Western civilization took place in a Milanese garden in 386: the conversion of St. Augustine of Hippo. This conversion, recounted by Augustine himself in his Confessions, is also the subject of a book-length study by major twentieth century theologian Romano Guardini. First published in English in 1960, The Conversion of Augustine has long been unavailable. Thomas More College Press is pleased to bring back Guardini’s masterful work to English-language readers with a new introduction by Louis Dupré, T. Lawrason Riggs Professor Emeritus in the Department of Religious Studies at Yale.
Romano Guardini, an Italian-born German priest and academic, was Professor of Catholic Theology at the University of Munich. As Dupré puts it in his introduction, “During the years immediately preceding and following the war, [Guardini’s] was the voice of a new, more sober Catholicism in Europe. In various ways he described the role of Christian faith within the context of contemporary culture.” His books include The End of the Modern World, The Lord, “searching meditations on the life of Christ” in Dupré’s assessment, and The Spirit of the Liturgy, the work which inspired Joseph Ratzinger’s widely read book of the same name.
Originating in a series of lectures, The Conversion of Augustine is divided into two parts–the first defining Augustine’s ideas, the second unfolding Augustine’s description of his conversion in the Confessions. “A substantial philosophical work,” according to Dupré, “the merit of Guardini’s beautiful book consists in having restated Augustine’s eternal insight in the light and darkness of contemporary existence.”
The Conversion of Augustine by Romano Guardini, translated from the German by Elinor Briefs, with a new introduction by Louis Dupré, is available now from Thomas More College Press. $35.
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