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Epiphany
Sermons
2004
2003
2002
2001
2000
St. Augustine, in
Sermon 4 on the Epiphany (De Temp. 42). From Sunday Sermons of the
Great Fathers, vol. 1, p. 198.
These Wise Men, what were they but the first fruits of the Gentiles? The
shepherds were Israelites, the Magi Gentiles. The former from close by,
the latter from far away; both hasten to the Corner Stone. (Again, from
Serm. 2.) Jesus is made manifest neither to the learned nor to the just.
For ignorance dominated the rusticity of the shepherds, impiety the practices
of the Magi. But that Corner Stone joins them both to Himself, Who came
to select the foolish that He might confound the wise, and to call not
the just but the sinners to repentance; so that no great one might take
pride in himself, and no lowly one despair.
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