Repentance with James K.A. Smith

Jamie Smith describes Augustine as an AA sponsor for the soul. Confessions offers us a searingly honest glimpse into the human heart as Augustine repents at the level of his desire.

Show Notes

Repentance and St. Augustine

We continue our Lenten podcast series by considering the spiritual practice of repentance with author, philosophy professor, and Trinity Forum Senior Fellow, James K.A. Smith. 

Few figures cast as long a shadow over church history as Saint Augustine of Hippo, regarded by many as second only to St. Paul in terms of his extraordinary contributions to theology and philosophy. For his part, James K.A. Smith takes a different approach, describing Augustine as an AA sponsor for the soul.

Disordered Desire and the Role of Repentance

In Augustine’s book, Confessions, he offers us a searingly honest glimpse into the human heart and it’s Augustine’s refusal to look away from his own disordered loves, but instead to confess and repent at the level of his deepest desires, that makes Confessions one of the most enduring works of Christian spiritual writing of all time.

Learn more about James K.A. Smith.

Watch the full Online Conversation and read the transcript.

 

Authors and books mentioned in the conversation:

Confessions by St. Augustine

On The Road With Saint Augustine by James. K.A. Smith

 

Related Trinity Forum Readings:

Devotions by John Donne and paraphrased by Philip Yancey

The Confessions of St. Augustine by Augustine of Hippo, Introduced by James K.A. Smith

Pilgrim at Tinker Creek by Annie Dillard

Pilgrim’s Progress by John Bunyan

God’s Grandeur: The Poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins

A Spiritual Pilgrimage by Malcolm Muggeridge.

 

Related Conversations:

Liturgy of the Ordinary in Extraordinary Times with Tish Harrison Warren

Caring for Words in a Culture of Lies with Marilyn McEntyre

Invitation to Solitude and Silence with Ruth Haley Barton

The Second Mountain with David Brooks

On the Road with Saint Augustine with James K.A. Smith and Elizabeth Bruenig

To listen to this or any of our episodes in full, visit ttf.org, and to join the Trinity Forum Society and help make content like this possible, visit ttf.org/join.

 

Special thanks to Ned Bustard for the artwork and Andrew Peterson for the music.

What is Trinity Forum Conversations?

Trinity Forum Conversations is a podcast exploring the big questions in life by looking to the best of the Christian intellectual tradition and elevating the voices, both ancient and modern, who grapple with these questions and direct our hearts to the Author of the answers. We invite you to join us in one of the great joys of life: a conversation among friends on the things that matter most.