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to mystic institute.org. The priest as sinner in the thought of St. Augustine, first of all,

why if I choose this as a topic? Because it deals with virtue from the other end of the spectrum.

What happens when we fail?

What happens with sin?

When we lack virtue? Or when virtue comes into question.

If the Donatist controversy is treated nowadays at all in seminaries and divinity schools, it is probably mentioned

only briefly, because perhaps in a survey course on church history, perhaps in a course

on sacramental theology. What most students take away from this treatment, I am guessing,

is at best only a general awareness that early on in the 4th century a group of radical African Christians

concluded that bishops who were in communion with other bishops

who had handed over sacred books to Roman imperial officials during the Diocletian persecution

were not real bishops.

And that the sacraments they administered were neither valid nor efficacious.

Now, what am I saying here? There was a controversy. It broke out in Africa in the 4th century, mid-fourth century,

and it involved Donat, a group of bishops who became known to be Donatists. They didn't start out that way. And what they decided was that they were the only

valid bishops in the entire Catholic Church,

both Africa, Europe, Asia, everything.

And the reason was that some bishops in Africa, we're talking about North Africa,

...