Wilken summarizes Augustine’s social vision of perfection this way: “This peace for which the city of God yearns is a ‘perfectly ordered and harmonious fellowship in the enjoyment of God,’ a peace of ‘enjoying one another in God.’ Notice that Augustine’s language is social, not individualistic. He does not say, ‘fellowship with God,’ but enjoying one another in God, or as one translator has it, a ’ mutual fellowship in God.’ Augustine’s controlling metaphor for the new life that God creates is not, for example, being born again, but becoming part of a city and entering into its communal life.”
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