My friend Vito, in a fit of cruelty, sent me this article about an exhibit of early-Christian art — in northern Italy. Sigh.

Travis at Catholic Tube has posted two more videos with patristic content: The Eucharist and the Fathers and St. Augustine and Pornography. The latter is an rip-roarin’ evangelistic reading of the Confessions (with interpolations) to a Protestant men’s group.

We continue our sampling of the new, just-released third volume of Letter & Spirit, the St. Paul Center‘s annual academic journal. Last week I baited the hook with Cardinal Avery Dulles’s study of the Church and the kingdom and Gary Anderson’s discussion of the “treasury of merit” in the ancient rabbis and Church Fathers. Today we turn eastward as we consider Carmelite Father Emmanuel Kaniyamparampil’s of “feminine-maternal images of the Holy Spirit” in the Syriac Fathers. Here’s Scott Hahn’s summary, in the volume’s general introduction:

In our Tradition & Traditions section, we retrieve an important theological motif from the early Christian tradition. Emmanuel Kaniyamparampil looks at feminine-maternal images of the Holy Spirit in Syriac Christianity, a tradition with close linguistic and historic roots to the first Jewish Christians. This is a careful study that shows the biblical roots of this metaphor and its possibilities for fruitful reflection on the role of the Spirit in the life of the believer.

Scott Hahn has covered some of the same ground in an essay posted online.

Father Kaniyamparampil is a patristics scholar and seminary professor based in Bangalore, India. He received his doctorate in sacred theology from the Catholic University of Paris. He is a longtime correspondent of mine and a great promoter of The Fathers of the Church in India.

Remember: the third volume of Letter & Spirit is part of the registration package for each and every person who attends our Letter & Spirit conference — this very weekend. Please consider going. You’ll hear some of the Fathers’ greatest living interpreters, and you really can’t beat the price! Hope to see you there!

While I was out, two DVDs arrived from Ignatius Press:

Apostolic Fathers: Handing on the Faith — Steve Ray spotlights the lives of Ignatius, Clement of Rome, Polycarp, Irenaeus, and Justin. The documentary was shot entirely on location in Israel, Turkey, France, and Italy.

Lost Gospels or False Gospels? — This documentary examines the New Testament apocrypha and features interviews with excellent scholars like Craig Evans, Ben Witherington, Amy-Jill Levine, Ted Sri, Tim Gray, and many others.

These look promising. I’ll let you know more as soon as I have a few moments to watch.

As you’ve probably noticed, I’m pretty excited about the arrival of the third volume of Letter & Spirit, our annual academic journal from the St. Paul Center. This issue includes rich studies of the Fathers. Yesterday I mentioned Gary Anderson’s use of the Syriac Fathers to explain the idea of the “treasury of merit” in early Judaism and Christianity. Earlier in the same volume we find an important argument from the celebrated Cardinal-theologian Avery Dulles. Here’s Scott Hahn’s take:

Avery Cardinal Dulles, S.J., explores one of the knottiest questions in exegesis and biblical theology—the meaning of “the kingdom of God” in the preaching of Christ. “The Church and the Kingdom: A Study of their Relationship in Scripture, Tradition, and Evangelization,” is a fine study of this question in light of the “great tradition,” exploring the biblical, patristic, scholastic, dogmatic, and magisterial record. Indeed, he shows that serious distortions arise when the question is considered apart from the tradition. This article has implications not only for theology and exegesis, but also for ecumenical dialogue and for understanding the Church’s evangelical mission in a pluralistic world.

To those of you who are reading aloud to your friends and co-workers: please note that the essay addresses one of the “knottiest questions” and not the naughtiest. In fact, Augustine applied a good deal of his remarkably pure intellect to the question. Cardinal Dulles ponders Augustine’s reflections, as well as those of Origen, Cyprian, and Gregory the Great.

The third volume of Letter & Spirit is part of the veritable kingdom inherited by each and every person who attends our Letter & Spirit conference next week. Every registered attendee gets a copy. Hope to see you there!

All the news services have, understandably, been starstruck by the announcement of the new cardinals-to-be, including Pittsburgh’s beloved Daniel DiNardo. (Take a breath, Galveston-Houston. He was ours before he was yours.) So, as of early this morning, none of my regulars had gotten around to translating Pope Benedict’s audience on Eusebius of Vercelli. Teresa Benedetta, however, was there, her station keeping, for which we’re grateful. Her translation follows.

Dear brothers and sisters,

This morning, I invite you to reflect on Saint Eusebius of Vercelli, the first bishop of northern Italy about whom we have definite information.

Born in Sardinia at the start of the fourth century, he moved to Rome with his family at a young age. Later, he became a lector, thus becoming part of the clergy of Rome at a time when the Church was sorely tried by the Arian heresy.

The great respect which grew around Eusebius explains his election in 345 to the episcopal seat of Vercelli. The new bishop immediately began an intense work of evangelization in a territory that was still largely pagan, especially in the rural areas.

Inspired by Saint Athanasius – who had written the ‘Life of St. Anthony Abbot’, founder of eastern monasticism – he founded in Vercelli a priestly community that was similar to a monastic one.

This monastery gave the clergy of northern Italy a significant imprint of apostolic sanctity, and gave rise to important bishop figures, like Limenius and Honoratus, his successors in Vercelli; Gaundentius in NOvara, Esuperantius in Tortona, Eustasius in Aosta, Eulogius in Ivrea, Maximus in Turin – all venerated by the Church as saints.

Solidly educated in the Nicene faith, Eusebius defended with all his strength the full divinity of Jesus Christ, defined by the Nicene creed as ‘of the same substance’ as the Father. To this end, he allied himself with the great Fathers of the 4th century – especially with St. Athanasius, the leading advocate of Nicene orthodoxy – against the Arian politics of the Roman emperor.

For the emperor, the simpler Arian belief appeared politically more useful as the ideology of the empire. For him, the truth did not matter, but rather, political opportunity – he wanted to use religion as a tool for unifying the empire. But the great Fathers resisted, defending truth from domination by politics.

For this reason, Eusebius was condemned to exile like so many other bishops in both East and West – St. Athanasius himself, St. Hilary of Poitiers, whom we talked about last week; Osius of Cordova.

At Scitopolis in Palestine, to where he was exiled in 355-360, Eusebius wrote an amazing page of his life. Even here, he founded a monastery with a small group of disciples, and from here, he carried on a correspondence with his faithful in Piedmont, demonstrated best by the second of the three Eusebian letters that have been recognized to be authentic.

After 360, he was further exiled to Cappadocia and in the Thebaide, where he underwent severe physical maltreatment. In 361, Emperor Constance II died and was succeeded by Emperor Julian, known as the Apostate, who was not interested in Christianity as the religion of empire, but simply wanted to restore paganism.

He put an end to the exile of bishops and even conceded that Eusebius could take back his seat in Vercelli. In 362, Eusebius was invited by Athanasius to take part in the Council of Alexandria, which decided to pardon Arian bishops provided they reverted to the lay state.

Eusebius was able to exercise the episcopal ministry for another decade at least, until he died, establishing with his city an exemplary relationship which did not fail to inspire the pastoral service of other bishops of northern Italy, whom we shall talk about in subsequent catecheses, like St. Ambrose of Milan and St. Maximus of Turin.

The relationship between the Bishop of Vercelli and his city is made clear above all by two epistolary proofs. The first is in the letter we already referred to, which Eusebius wrote from exile in Scitopolis “to my most beloved brothers and priests, as well as to the holy peoples keeping firm faith in Vercelli, Novara, Ivrea and Tortona” (Ep. secunda, CCL 9, p. 104).

This greeting, which indicated the emotion of the good shepherd when speaking of his flock, has a counterpart at the end of the letter, in the warm greetings of the father to each and everyone of his sons in Vercelli, with expressions overflowing with affection and love.

One must note the explicit relationship between the bishop to the sanctae plebes (holy people) not only of Vercellae/Vercelli – the first, and for many more years, the oly diocese of Piedmont – but also of Novaria/Novara, Eporedia/Ivrea e Dertona/Tortona, those Christian communities within his diocese that had reached a certain consistency and autonomy.

Another interesting element is the farewell with which he concludes the letter: Eusebius asks his sons and daughters to greet “even those who are outside the Church who have sentiments of love for us:
etiam hos, qui foris sunt et nos dignantur diligere”. Evident sign that the bishop’s relations with his city was not limited to the Christian population, but extended also to those who, from outside the Church, recognized his spiritual authority in some way and loved him as an exemplary man.

The second proof of the singular relationship the bishop had with his city comes from the letter that St. Ambrose of Milan wrote to the people of Vercelli around 394, more than 20 years after Eusebius’s death (Ep. extra collectionem 14: Maur. 63).

The Church of Vercelli was going through a difficult time: it was divided and without a bishop. With frankness, Ambrose said he hesitated to acknowledge in them “the descendants of the holy fathers who approved of Eusebius [elected him bishop of Vercelli] as soon as they saw him even without having known him beforehand, to the extent of passing over their own townmates.”

In the same letter, the Bishop of Milan attested in the clearest way his esteem for Eusebius: “A man as great as he,” he wrote definitively, “truly merits being elected by the whole Church.”

Ambrose’s admiration for Eusebius was based above all on the fact that Eusebius governed his diocese with the witness of his own life: “He governed the Church with the austerity of fasting.”

In fact, Ambrose himself was fascinated – as he himself admitted – by the monastic ideal of contemplating God which Eusebius had pursued in the footsteps of the prophet Elia.

To begin with, Ambrose has noted, the Bishop of Vercelli gathered his own priests into community life and edicated them “in the observance of monastic rules even while living in a city”.

The bishopa and his priests had to share the problems of their fellow citizens, and they did this credibly by cultivating at the same time a different citizenship, that of Heaven (cfr Heb 13,14). Thus they truly constructed a genuine citizenship in true solidarity with the citizens of Vercelli.

And so Eusebius, while he took up the cause of the ‘sancta plebs’ of Vercelli, lived in the midst of the city like a monk, opening his city to God. This trait did not take anything away from his exemplary pastoral dynamism.

It seems, among other things, that he set up parish churches to render stable and systematic church services and that he promoted Marian sanctuaries for the coversion of pagan rural areas. So his monastic ‘trait’ conferred a particular dimension on the relationship of the bishop with his city.

Like the Apostles, for whom Jesus prayed at the Last Supper, the pastors and the faithful of the Church ‘are in the world’ (Jn 17,11)but not ‘of the world.’ Therefore, the pastors, Eusebius reminds us, should exhort the faithful not to consider the cities of the world as their permanent dwelling, but to seek the future city, the definitive Jerusalem in heaven.

This ‘eschatological reservation’ allows the pastors and the faithful to keep an authentic scale of values, without ever yielding to the fashion of the moment and to the unjust demands of prevailing political power.

The authentic scale of values, Eusebius’s whole life seems to tell us, does not come from the emperors of yesterday or today, but from Jesus Christ, the perfect man, equal to the Fahter in divinity, but a man like us.

Referring to this scale of values, Eusebius does not tire of “warmly recommending” to his faithful “to guard the faith with every care, to maintain concord, and to be assiduous in prayer” (Ep. secunda, cit.).

Dear friends, I too recommend to you with all my heart these perennial values, while I greet and bless you with the words which St. Eusebius used to conclude his second letter: “I address you all, my brothers and holy sisters, sons and daughters, the faithful of both sexes and every age … so that you may bring our greetings even to those who are outside the Church but who deign to nourish sentiments of love for us” (ibid.).

Today is the feast of St. Luke the Evangelist. Jerome remembered him thusly:

Luke a physician of Antioch, as his writings indicate, was not unskilled in the Greek language. An adherent of the apostle Paul, and companion of all his journeying, he wrote a Gospel, concerning which the same Paul says, “We send with him a brother whose praise in the gospel is among all the churches” and to the Colossians “Luke the beloved physician salutes you,” and to Timothy “Luke only is with me.” He also wrote another excellent volume to which he prefixed the title Acts of the Apostles, a history which extends to the second year of Paul’s sojourn at Rome, that is to the fourth year of Nero, from which we learn that the book was composed in that same city. Therefore the Acts of Paul and Thecla and all the fable about the lion baptized by him we reckon among the apocryphal writings, for how is it possible that the inseparable companion of the apostle in his other affairs, alone should have been ignorant of this thing. Moreover Tertullian who lived near those times, mentions a certain presbyter in Asia, an adherent of the apostle Paul, who was convicted by John of having been the author of the book, and who, confessing that he did this for love of Paul, resigned his office of presbyter. Some suppose that whenever Paul in his epistle says “according to my gospel” he means the book of Luke and that Luke not only was taught the gospel history by the apostle Paul who was not with the Lord in the flesh, but also by other apostles. This he too at the beginning of his work declares, saying “Even as they delivered unto us, which from the beginning were eyewitnesses and ministers of the word.” So he wrote the gospel as he had heard it, but composed the Acts of the apostles as he himself had seen. He was buried at Constantinople to which city, in the twentieth year of Constantius, his bones together with the remains of Andrew the apostle were transferred.

The much-anticipated third volume of Letter & Spirit has rolled off the presses and into the warehouse. In fact, I’m holding a copy in my hands. It features fascinating studies by the best and brightest: Cardinals Avery Dulles and Christoph Schonborn, Michael Waldstein, Romanus Cessario, David Fagerberg, and Scott Hahn. One of my favorite essays is by Gary Anderson of Notre Dame. Here’s how my friend Scott Hahn sums it up in the volume’s opening editorial:

“Redeem Your Sins by the Giving of Alms: Sin, Debt, and the ‘Treasury of Merit’ in Early Jewish and Christian Tradition,” the contribution by Gary A. Anderson, also has important ecumenical implications. This ambitious article explores the roots of the complex spiritual and theological tradition that became a flashpoint in the Reformation—“the treasury of the merits of Christ and the saints.”

The idea of sin as a kind of debt owed to God is seen in the Our Father (Matt. 6:12). Likewise, the notion that charity covers a multitude of sins is clear enough from the New Testament record (1 Pet. 4:8). But Anderson locates the roots of this tradition much deeper in the Jewish scriptural and interpretative tradition. He then traces the nuances of its development through the New Testament, the rabbis, and the witness of early Syriac Christianity. This is serious exegesis and theology with significant implications for apologetics and ecumenical dialogue, as Anderson concludes with not a little understatement: “I think it is fair to say that the practice of issuing an indulgence is not as unbiblical as one might have imagined.”

For those who are keeping a patristic scorecard, Dr. Anderson calls to the witness stand the Didache, Clement of Alexandria, the Letter to Diognetus, Augustine, and most especially St. Ephrem. All these follow after an all-star team of ancient rabbis. This is a blockbuster article. It, um, merits your immediate attention.

The third volume of Letter & Spirit is part of the great treasury of merit that will be dispensed to each and every person who attends our Letter & Spirit conference next week. Hope to see you there!

Pope Benedict named a gaggle of new cardinals today. Two are from the United States, and one of those men, Archbishop Daniel DiNardo of Galveston-Houston (Texas), is a patrologist. He earned his license in patristics at the Pontifical University Augustinianum in Rome. I know no other preacher who produces quotations from the Fathers so readily, from memory. (Back in the day when he was a pastor, I saw him do this at baptisms, funerals, ordinary Sunday Masses, and gatherings of Catholic school teachers.) He is, as you can probably guess, a Pittsburgh priest.

UPDATE: A great quote from Pittsburgh’s Bishop David Zubik, who was a seminary classmate of Cardinal-designate DiNardo: “You can take the priest out of Pittsburgh, but not Pittsburgh out of the priest, and Cardinal-designate DiNardo has been home many times in the last 10 years,” Bishop Zubik said. “I pray that he will be able to continue to come to see us in the years ahead, and we can assure him of a warm Pittsburgh welcome.”

Today’s the memorial of St. Ignatius of Antioch. You can download audio of his collected works here. You can hear me blathering about his life here (about mid-page). In my opinion, he is the great witness to the Church’s early doctrinal self-understanding.

Somebody call the Holy Office. Stephen Colbert jumped out of the TV this week for a guest spot at Maureen Dowd’s New York Times column. Shamelessly putting himself forward as a presidential candidate, he outlined his core convictions, among them: “After Jesus was born, the Old Testament basically became a way for Bible publishers to keep their word count up.” This from the guy who played Irenaeus to Elaine Pagels’ Valentinus. Say it ain’t so!

It’s not too late to act on impulse and take that long-deferred dream vacation to Pittsburgh. You’ll find every good reason to do it in the Letter & Spirit Conference, sponsored by the St. Paul Center for Biblical Theology, which I serve as vice-president.

It all starts on Friday, Oct. 26, at 7:30 p.m., at St. Paul Seminary in Crafton, with a free public lecture by my friend Scott Hahn. Hahn will speak about the mysteries of the life of Christ.

The theme of the conference, “Jesus and the Mysteries,” is inspired by the recent book by Pope Benedict XVI, Jesus of Nazareth. Speakers include some of the country’s leading experts on the Church Fathers:

Dr. Scott Hahn, “What Do We Mean By Mysteries?”

Dr. R.R. Reno, “Sonship, Testing, and the Fear of the Lord”

Dr. Brant Pitre, “Jesus and the Mystery of the Temple”

Dr. Daniel Keating, “Baptism, Sonship and Salvation: Is Deification a Christian Doctrine?”

Father Robert Barron, “Banquet, Sacrifice, and Real Presence: A Biblical Perspective on the Eucharist”

Father Francis Martin, “Jesus and the Jewish Festivals” (the third annual Lawler Lecture)

Bishop David Zubik will celebrate Mass and deliver the homily on Oct. 27.

The cost is $79 ($35 for full-time students; free for seminarians). The price includes all meals and the new volume of Letter & Spirit, the Center’s academic journal. This issue includes new work by Cardinal Avery Dulles and Christoph Schonborn, Gary Anderson, Michael Waldstein, Romanus Cessario, and Scott Hahn. (I’ll post more on the journal throughout this week, highlighting its remarkable patristic content.)

Registration for the conference is required and is available on a first-come, first-served basis. Get your registration info online here. Or call the St. Paul Center: (740) 264-9535. Please spread the word to others who might be interested.

And now for something completely different: Aphrahat audible.

Here’s a review of that Dayton exhibit that Maureen told us about.

Yesterday, Pope Benedict turned westward in his patristic studies. His audience talk focused on Hilary of Poitiers. Here’s the unofficial Zenit translation:

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

Today I would like to speak about a great Father of the Western Church, St. Hilary of Poitiers, one of the great bishops of the 4th century. Confronted with the Arians, who considered the Son of God a creature, albeit an excellent one, Hilary dedicated his life to the defense of faith in the divinity of Jesus Christ, Son of God, and God as the Father, who generated him from all eternity.

We do not have definitive data about most of Hilary’s life. Ancient sources say that he was born in Poitiers, probably around the year 310. From a well-to-do family, he received a good literary education, which is clearly evident in his writings. It does not seem that he was raised in a Christian environment. He himself tells us about a journey of searching for the truth, which little by little led him to the recognition of God the creator and of the incarnate God, who died to give us eternal life. He was baptized around 345, and elected bishop of Poitiers around 353-354.

In the years that followed, Hilary wrote his first work, the “Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew.” It is the oldest surviving commentary in Latin that we have on this Gospel. In 356, Hilary, as bishop, attended the Synod of Beziers in southern France, which he called the “Synod of the False Apostles,” given that the assembly was dominated by bishops who were followers of Arianism, and thus negated the divinity of Jesus Christ. These “false apostles” asked Emperor Constantine to condemn to exile the bishop of Poitiers. So Hilary was forced to leave Gaul during the summer of 356.

Exiled to Phrygia, in present-day Turkey, Hilary found himself in contact with a religious environment totally dominated by Arianism. There, too, his pastoral solicitude led him to work tirelessly for the re-establishment of the Church’s unity, based on the correct faith, as formulated by the Council of Nicea. To this end, he began writing his most important and most famous dogmatic work: “De Trinitatae” (On the Trinity).

In it, Hilary talks about his own personal journey toward knowing God, and he is intent on showing that Scriptures clearly attest to the Son’s divinity and his equality with the Father, not only in the New Testament, but also in many pages of the Old Testament, in which the mystery of Christ is already presented. Faced with the Arians, he insists on the truth of the names of the Father and the Son and develops his entire Trinitarian theology departing from the formula of baptism given to us by the Lord himself: “In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.”

The Father and the Son are of the same nature. And if some passages of the New Testament could lead one to think that the Son is inferior to the Father, Hilary offers precise rules to avoid misleading interpretations: Some passages in Scripture speak about Jesus as God, others emphasize his humanity. Some refer to him in his pre-existence with the Father; others take into consideration his self lowering (“kenosis”), his lowering himself unto death; and lastly, others contemplate him in the glory of the resurrection.

During the years of his exile, Hilary also wrote the “Book of the Synod,” in which, for his brother bishops of Gaul, he reproduces and comments on the confessions of faith and other documents of the synods which met in the East around the middle of the 4th century. Always firm in his opposition to radical Arians, St. Hilary showed a conciliatory spirit with those who accepted that the Son was similar to the Father in essence, naturally trying to lead them toward the fullness of faith, which says that there is not only a similarity, but a true equality of the Father and the Son in their divinity.

This also seems characteristic: His conciliatory spirit tries to understand those who still have not yet arrived to the fullness of the truth and helps them, with great theological intelligence, to reach the fullness of faith in the true divinity of the Lord Jesus Christ.

In 360 or 361, Hilary was finally able to return from exile to his homeland and immediately resumed the pastoral work in his Church, but the influence of his teaching extended, in fact, well beyond its borders. A synod celebrated in Paris in 360 or 361 took up again the language used by the Council of Nicea. Some ancient authors think that this anti-Arian development of the bishops of Gaul was due, in large part, to the strength and meekness of the bishop of Poitiers.

This was precisely his gift: uniting strength of faith and meekness in interpersonal relationships. During the last years of his life, he wrote “Treatises on the Psalms,” a commentary on 58 psalms, interpreted according to the principle highlighted in the introduction to the work: “There is no doubt that all the things said in the Psalms must be understood according to the Gospel proclamation, so that, independently of the voice with which the prophetic spirit has spoken, everything refers to the knowledge of the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, incarnation, passion and kingdom, and the glory and power of our resurrection” (“Instructio Psalmorum,” 5).

In all of the Psalms, he sees this transparency of Christ’s mystery and of his body, which is the Church. On various occasions, Hilary met with St. Martin: The future bishop of Tours founded a monastery near Poitiers, which still exists today. Hilary died in 367. His feast day is celebrated on Jan. 13. In 1851, Blessed Pius IX proclaimed him a doctor of the Church.

To summarize the essential aspects of his doctrine, I would like to say that the starting point for Hilary’s theological reflection is the baptismal faith. In “De Trinitate,” he writes: Jesus “commanded to baptize in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit (cf. Matthew 28:19), that is to say, confessing the Author, the Only Begotten One and the Gift. One alone is the author of all things, because there is only one God the Father, from whom all things proceed. And one alone is our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom all things were made (1 Corinthians 8:6), and one alone is the Spirit (Ephesians 4:4), gift in everything. … Nothing can be found lacking in a plenitude that is so grand, in which converges in the Father, and in the Son, and in the Holy Spirit, the immensity of the Eternal, the revelation in the Image, the joy in the Gift” (“De Trinitatae” 2:1).

God the Father, being all love, is able to communicate the fullness of his divinity to the Son. I find this phrase of St. Hilary to be particularly beautiful: “God only knows how to be love, only knows how to be Father. And he who loves is not envious, and whoever is Father, is so totally. This name does not allow for compromise, as if to say that God is father only in certain aspects and not in others” (ibid. 9:61).

For this reason, the Son is fully God without lacking anything or having any lessening: “He who comes from the perfect is perfect, because he who has everything, has given him everything” (ibid. 2:8). Only in Christ, Son of God and Son of Man, does humanity find salvation. Taking on human nature, he united every man to himself, “he became our flesh” (“Tractatus in Psalmos” 54:9); “he took on the nature of all flesh, thus becoming the true vine, the root of all branches” (ibid. 51:16).

Precisely because of this motive, the path to Christ is open to all — because he drew everyone into his humanity — even though personal conversion is always required: “Through the relationship with his flesh, access to Christ is open to everyone, provided that they leave aside the old man (cf. Ephesians 4:22) and nail him to his cross (cf. Colossians 2:14); provided they abandon their former works and are converted, in order to be buried with him in baptism, in view of life (cf. Colossians 1:12; Romans 6:4)” (ibid. 91:9).

Faithfulness to God is a gift of his grace. Therefore St. Hilary asks, at the end of his treatise on the Trinity, to be able to remain faithful to the faith of baptism. One of the characteristics of this book is this: Reflection is transformed into prayer and prayer leads to reflection. The entire book is a dialogue with God.

I would like to end today’s catechesis with one of these prayers, that also becomes our prayer: “Grant, O Lord,” Hilary prays in a moment of inspiration, “that I may remain faithful to that which I professed in the symbol of my regeneration, when I was baptized in the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. That I may adore you, our Father, and together with you, your Son; that I may be worthy of your Holy Spirit, who proceeds from you through your only Son. … Amen” (“De Trinitatae” 12:57).