St. Ambrose

Catholic Saints

Augustine Institute

History

4.8 • 907 Ratings

🗓️ 7 December 2025

⏱️ 19 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

St. Ambrose (c. 340–397 AD) was the Bishop of Milan and a Doctor of the Church, known for his defense of Nicene Christianity against Arianism. Born into a prominent Roman family, he pursued a career in law and governance before his unexpected election as bishop, despite being unbaptized. A skilled theologian and eloquent orator, he influenced both church and state, famously calling Emperor Theodosius I to repentance after the massacre at Thessalonica. Ambrose’s hymns, writings, and pastoral work left a lasting legacy, including his role in the conversion and baptism of St. Augustine. His feast day is celebrated on December 7.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	You're listening to a podcast on Catholic Saints.
0:05.0	This podcast is produced by the Augustine Institute,
0:09.0	an Apostolate helping Catholics understand,res, and I'm the executive director of Formed,
0:26.5	and an associate professor of theology here at the Augustine Institute Graduate School of Theology.
0:32.0	Joining me today is Dr. Elizabeth Klein, one of my colleagues and friends here at the Augustine Institute.
0:37.2	And today we're going to talk about the Feast day of St. Ambrose, December 7th.
0:41.3	We celebrate this great father of the church, this great formator in Augustine's lives and in so many lives as well that have echoed down throughout the centuries.
0:50.3	Before we get into the topic today, I wanted to thank you for your support of the
0:55.9	Augustine Institute, for your support of the work of formed, especially those who have joined
1:00.2	Mission Circle. Your support, your monthly donations are what makes these shows possible. So thank you
1:05.9	very much for that. We're talking about St. Ambrose today, and he is considered one of the four fathers of the church, of the Western Church, along with St. Augustine, St. Gregory the Great, St. Jerome.
1:17.4	These are four pillars of the Western Church, who had such an important role in the formation of Christian culture and the formation of Christian thought throughout the centuries.
1:27.9	And so we want to tell you about his story and the influence he had on Augustine's life,
1:31.6	but also the influence he can have in our life as well.
1:33.9	So, Liz, could you tell us a little bit about Ambrose and was he always Christian or, you know,
1:40.3	what do we know about Ambrose?
1:42.4	Yeah, so that was a great lead-in.
1:44.2	I think Ambrose, along with Gregory the Great, maybe isn't as well known as they were in the past.
1:50.0	You know, if you look at a lot of art, you know, throughout the ages, you'll have these four doctors often together in art.
1:57.4	So when you see Jerome and Augustine there, the other two people are probably Gregory the Great in Ambrose.
2:02.7	So Ambrose was raised in a Christian household, but he followed his father's footsteps in being a politician.
2:09.2	So Ambrose was actually the governor of Milan and surrounding area, which at that time was the capital of the Roman Empire.
	...

Transcript will be available on the free plan in 9 days. Upgrade to see the full transcript now.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Augustine Institute, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Augustine Institute and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.