Introductory Breitbach Courses

I entered my freshman year at likely the peak of my Catholicism.  My confirmation had just taken place the previous year, and I was still riding the emotional high of being accepted into a group with similar values.  Unlike most other students at Loras College, I was probably looking forward to my MOI course the most because it was the Breitbach Catholic Thinkers and Leaders course that dealt with important writers from throughout the history of the Catholic Church.  Each day in this class left me emotionally charged and excited for my future as a contributing Catholic in society.  Below is my unabridged response to a prompt from the final for this course.  We were asked to give our impression on a quote from St. Augustine's Confessions.  

What shocks me about revisiting this piece is just how convinced I was of God’s reality.  This may have been because I did not actually think there was any alternative belief system.  The term "atheist" most definitely had a derogatory meaning at this time for me.  While I believe this version of me was naïve and unrealistic, this was a time of great happiness in my life.

            The quote “...our heart is unquiet until it rests in you” is one of the key points that St. Augustine is trying to make throughout his confessions.  This quote basically means that everything comes from God, and we are pulled towards a life with him.  It also says that we are not the best version of ourselves, or more simply put “our true self,” until we fully accept God and Christ as our savior.

            This statement is a basis for everything that Augustine will say throughout the rest of his story.  He gains this knowledge the hard way by struggling through the first years of his life with sin and trying to defy God by acting like he is above it all.  Only when he truly accepts God in his life does he feel that he is at peace with himself.  This does not mean that his struggles have ended, but rather, that he now has God along with him to help ease the pain of difficult situations.  The load of the task is a little easier when we are with God.  Augustine reiterates his belief that we are incomplete without God time and time again throughout this reading.

            This quote was one of the first that I remember reading, and it really stuck out to me from the start.  I think the reason it caught my attention was because of the previous readings about our “true selves.”  I fully agree with Augustine that we are incomplete without Christ present with us.  In my opinion, this is the most important piece of information because everything else kind of builds off of it.  The statement foreshadows what is to come in the rest of the chapters.  This was the main point I received from “The Confessions.”