What is Conversion in Augustines' City of God?

As Christians and people of faith in the God of life, we are called to make some urgent ethical choices. A social conversion towards the common good of all in our society—locally and globally, and towards harmony with mother earth and the environment is necessary. What is becoming clear to us as we understand better the root causes of social and ecological injustice at a global scale, is the violence embedded in our economic, political and cultural systems. These social systems of violence translate into interpersonal violence, which we experience at many levels.

New voices from our churches and faith communities continue to reiterate the call for a radical social transformation; there are serious ethical problems at the root of our political and economic choices as a society which need to be addressed.[1] The problems are structural, at the heart of the systems, and what we need is a radically new social vision. We need to re-think our way of life and reverse the systems of social violence. This call for radical social transformation I name as social conversion.

The term "social conversion" as such is not frequently used in religious or theological language. In dictionarie

s of Christian social thought, the term does not exist as a developed concept, and it is not identified as a common experience or praxis. We find in the social Christian literature of the recent years frequent reference to "social evil" and "sinful structures," "but not to "social conversion." The term "conversion" is commonly used in Christian tradition to denote a radical personal transformation and change of direction in life; making a radically different choices as a result of a divine revelation which opens one’s eyes to a different and new vision of life. This new revelation leads to a radical change in the way of thinking and living. I chose to use the same concept to talk about social change in society at large.[2]

(2) How do we talk about Jesus’ project of the Reign of God, of love, justice, and peace for us individually, for our community and for our world today? Where do we find witness in our society to the Reign of God? How do we name these witnesses? What does their witness have to say to us about our way of life?

Faith in the resurrection and hope for our world continue to be affirmed today—as in the time of Jesus—by the most humble and the poorest among us; those who live at the margin of our society. These signs of hope existed in every society and they are present among us as well. Opening our eyes of faith to see the work of the Spirit on the margins of our world, and affirming the hope growing from these "marginal" initiatives could be a source of hope for all of God’s creation. A collective affirmation of the genuine signs of

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