Man’s Emptiness, God’s Fulness

                                                                                                                                                Vol. XXI, No. 6, June/July 2008

Laziness pretends to yearn for rest, but what sure rest is there except in the Lord? Luxury would gladly be called plenty and abundance, but You are the fullness and unfailing abundance of unfading joy. Promiscuity presents a show of liberality, but You are the most lavish giver of all things good. Covetousness desires to possess much, but You are already the possessor of all things. Envy contends that its aim is for excellence, but what is as excellent as You? Anger seeks revenge, but who avenges more justly than You? Fear shrinks back as sudden change threatens the way things are and fear is wary for its own security, but what can happen that is unfamiliar or sudden to You, 0 God? Or who can deprive You of what You love? Where is there unshaken security except with You? Grief longs for those delightful things we've lost because it wills to have nothing taken from it, just as nothing can be taken from You.

Confessions of Saint Augustine, revised and updated by Dr. Tom Gill, Bridge-Logos, Gainesville, FL 2003, p. 46.