Novena to St. Augustine

August 28th.

1. By that lively joy which you, O glorious St. Austin, gave to St. Monica, your Mother, and to the whole Church, when enlightened from above, you resolved to submit yourself to the Faith: obtain for us all the grace to profit continually by the examples and advice of the virtuous, and to procure as much joy in heaven by the amendment of our lives as we have heretofore been the occasion of grief by our sins Gloria.

2. By the fervent gratitude with which you applied yourself to the study of the Divine law which you had so much violated, and your diligence to excite in others a love and esteem for it: obtain for us the grace to be always so grateful for all favours from heaven, that the Most High may be pleased to shed them upon us more copiously. Gloria.

3. By that most ardent zeal with which you applied yourself during the latter years of your life to confute and convert heretics, more especially the Manicheans, who had been the teachers and the companions of your licentious youth: obtain for us all the grace, to procure with all our strength, the conversion of sinners, and the improvement of the good, that so we may repair the scandals we have caused, by living so little in conformity to the faith which we profess. Gloria.

4. O glorious St. Augustine, by that profound humility which made you consider yourself unworthy, not only of every ecclesiastical dignity, but even of priestly ordination; and by that unalterable fidelity with which you fulfilled the priestly and episcopal duties when charged with them: obtain for us all the grace to consider ourselves unworthy of any distinguished employment, and to fulfil with fidelity all the duties of our state. Gloria.

5. By that abundance of supernatural light by which, O glorious St. Augustine, thou wast gifted, and became the most terrible scourge of all the enemies of Christianity, the master of learning, the strength of councils, the oracle of the whole Church, and wast called the sun of the earth, and compared to a bee, nourishing all the faithful with your honey, but piercing with your sting all heretics: obtain for us the grace to employ all our powers, corporal and mental, to support and defend the truths of faith, and to procure the greatest possible increase and glory to our common mother, the Church. Gloria.

6. By that especial care with which, O glorious St. Augustine, you guarded your own purity and the reputation of others, so that after your conversion, you avoided as much as possible the society of women, nor would endure the company of any slanderer: obtain for us all the grace to hate and avoid those whose society would contaminate our consciences, or whose words injure the reputation of our neighbour. Gloria.

7. By the great care with which you, O glorious St. Augustine, examined over again in your old age, all your writings, and freely corrected every sentence which was liable to misconception; and by the lively charity with which, in the siege which desolated your beloved people, you asked of the Lord that you might, like a good shepherd, become a sacrifice for the salvation of your flock: obtain for us the grace to amend instantly all our errors, to support with resignation all the adversities which befall us on earth, and to be always ready to part with life for the benefit of our brethren, that we may share with you the eternal blessedness of heaven. Gloria.