On the Catechising of the Uninstructed
Augustine of Hippo (354–430)
First published 405
Augustine's De catechizandis rudibus, staged here in the public-domain NPNF English translation by S. D. F. Salmond.
Caput I: How Augustin Writes in Answer to a Favor Asked by a Deacon of Carthage.
Caput II: How It Often Happens that a Discourse Which Gives Pleasure to the Hearer is Distasteful to the Speaker; And What Explanation is to Be Offered of that Fact.
Caput III: Of the Full Narration to Be Employed in Catechising.
Caput IV: That the Great Reason for the Advent of Christ Was the Commendation of Love.
Caput V: That the Person Who Comes for Catechetical Instruction is to Be Examined with Respect to His Views, on Desiring to Become a Christian.
Caput VI: Of the Way to Commence the Catechetical Instruction, and of the Narration of Facts from the History of the World’s Creation on to the Present Times of the Church.
Caput VII: Of the Exposition of the Resurrection, the Judgment, and Other Subjects, Which Should Follow This Narration.
Caput VIII: Of the Method to Be Pursued in Catechising Those Who Have Had a Liberal Education.
Caput IX: Of the Method in Which Grammarians and Professional Speakers are to Be Dealt with.
Caput X: Of the Attainment of Cheerfulness in the Duty of Catechising, and of Various Causes Producing Weariness in the Catechumen.
Caput XI: Of the Remedy for the Second Source of Weariness.
Caput XII: Of the Remedy for the Third Source of Weariness.
Caput XIII: Of the Remedy for the Fourth Source of Weariness.
Caput XIV: Of the Remedy Against the Fifth and Sixth Sources of Weariness.
Caput XV: Of the Method in Which Our Address Should Be Adapted to Different Classes of Hearers.
Caput XVI: A Specimen of a Catechetical Address; And First, the Case of a Catechumen with Worthy Views.
Caput XVII: The Specimen of Catechetical Discourse Continued, in Reference Specially to the Reproval of False Aims on the Catechumen’s Part.
Caput XVIII: Of What is to Be Believed on the Subject of the Creation of Man and Other Objects.
Caput XIX: Of the Co-Existence of Good and Evil in the Church, and Their Final Separation.
Caput XX: Of Israel’s Bondage in Egypt, Their Deliverance, and Their Passage Through the Red Sea.
Caput XXI: Of the Babylonish Captivity, and the Things Signified Thereby.
Caput XXII: Of the Six Ages of the World.
Caput XXIII: Of the Mission of the Holy Ghost Fifty Days After Christ’s Resurrection.
Caput XXIV: Of the Church in Its Likeness to a Vine Sprouting and Suffering Pruning.
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“But that vine, which was spreading forth its fruitful shoots throughout the circle of lands, according as had been prophesied with regard to it, and as had been foretold by the Lord Himself, sprouted all the more luxuriantly in proportion as it was watered with richer streams of the blood of martyrs. And as these died in behalf of the truth of the faith in countless numbers throughout all lands, even the persecuting kingdoms themselves desisted, and were converted to the knowledge and worship of Christ, with the neck of their pride broken. Moreover it behoved that this same vine should be pruned in accordance with the Lord’s repeated predictions, and that the unfruitful twigs should be cut out of it, by which heresies and schisms were occasioned in various localities, under the name of Christ, on the part of men who sought not His glory but their own; whose oppositions, however, also served more and more to discipline the Church, and to test and illustrate both its doctrine and its patience.
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“All these things, then, we now perceive to be realized precisely as we read of them in predictions uttered so long before the event. And as the first Christians, inasmuch as they did not see these things literally made good in their own day, were moved by miracles to believe them; so as regards ourselves, inasmuch as all these things have now been brought to pass exactly as we read of them in those books which were written a long time previous to the fulfillment of the things in question, wherein they were all announced as matters yet future, even as they are now seen to be actually present, we are built up unto faith, so that, enduring and persevering in the Lord, we believe without any hesitation in the destined accomplishment even of those things which still remain to be realized. For, indeed, in the same Scriptures, tribulations yet to come are still read of, as well as the final day of judgment itself, when all the citizens of these two states shall receive their bodies again, and rise and give account of their life before the judgment-seat of Christ. For He will come in the glory of His power, who of old condescended to come in the lowliness of humanity; and He will separate all the godly from the ungodly,—not only from those who have utterly refused to believe in Him at all, but also from those who have believed in Him to no purpose and without fruit. To the one class He will give an eternal kingdom together with Himself, while to the other He will award eternal punishment together with the devil. But as no joy yielded by things temporal can be found in any measure comparable to the joy of life eternal which the saints are destined to attain, so no torment of temporal punishments can be compared to the everlasting torments of the unrighteous.