What St. Augustine did to avoid gossip and foul language in his home

Lima Newsroom, Aug 28, 2024 / 15:53 pm

St. Augustine, whose feast day is today, Aug. 28, had an aversion for gossip to the extent he even placed a special notice in his house so that he and those who visited him would avoid this evil. Some bishops didn’t pay attention, and this is what happened.

In the Spanish-language book “Works of St. Augustine, Volume I” from the Library of Christian Authors, there is an ancient biography of this saint written by his disciple St. Possidius, considered by the Augustinians as “the first biographer of the bishop of Hippo.”

St. Possidius describes that St. Augustine’s clothes, shoes, and other household items “were modest and appropriate: neither too nice nor too base, because these things are often a reason for boasting or abjection [humiliation] for men, because they did not seek the interests of Jesus Christ but their own.”

At the table of the father and doctor of the Church, everything was sober, with plenty of vegetables and legumes. When there was meat, it was out of deference to a visitor. There was also wine, something that was not frowned upon in the culture of that time, which was drunk in moderation. His spoons were made of silver, but the dishes were made of clay, wood, or marble.

St. Possidius tells us that St. Augustine was “very hospitable” and that “at the table” he liked reading and conversing more “than the appetite for eating and drinking.”

He also had a warning against gossip that said: “He who is fond of chewing away at the lives of others is not worthy of sitting at this table.” And he asked the guests “not to pepper the conversation with gossip and slander.”

One day some bishops began to chat, ignoring the warning. St. Augustine was not pleased and exhorted them severely. Very grieved, he also told them that “either those words had to be taken back or he would get up from the table and retire to his room.”

“I and other dinner guests were witnesses to this scene,” St. Possidius recounted.

This story was first published by ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish-language news partner. It has been translated and adapted by CNA.