Augustine, of Hippo, Saint
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Augustine of Hippo (354–430) was a theologian and bishop, born in Thagaste in the Roman province of Numidia, in present-day Algeria, to a pagan father and a Christian mother, Monica. He studied in Carthage, spent years as a follower of the Manichaean religion, and taught rhetoric in Carthage, Rome and Milan. In Milan, influenced by the sermons of Bishop Ambrose, he converted to Christianity and was baptised in 387. He returned to Africa, was ordained a priest at Hippo Regius and became its bishop a few years later, a post he held for more than thirty years. Besides the Confessions, he wrote The City of God, prompted by the sack of Rome in 410, and many works against the theological opponents of his time. He died in 430 as the Vandals besieged Hippo, and his thought shaped Western Christianity for centuries.
