He was ordained a priest in 1762 and transferred to São Paulo, where, with only brief intervals, he spent the rest of his life. He was revered as a confessor and a healer, and popular devotion to him was such that both ecclesiastical postings and governmental decrees that would have taken him away from São Paulo soon had to be rescinded. He died there on 23 December 1822, at the Recollect House (a hermitage which he had served and defended since 1769).

  He was beatified in 1998 by Pope John Paul II and canonized by Pope Benedict XVI on 11 May 2007 during his visit to Brazil. He is the first Brazilian-born saint.

  Augustine had a brilliant legal and academic career, but after his conversion he returned home to Africa and led an ascetic life. He was elected Bishop of Hippo and spent 34 years looking after his flock, teaching them, strengthening them in the faith and protecting them strenuously against the errors of the time. He wrote an enormous amount and left a permanent mark on both philosophy and theology. His Confessions, as dazzling in style as they are deep in content, are a landmark of world literature. The Second Readings in the Office of Readings contain extracts from many of his sermons and commentaries and also from the Confessions.

  In the earliest centuries all vestments were white – the white of baptismal purity and of the robes worn by the armies of the redeemed in the Apocalypse, washed white in the blood of the Lamb. As the Church grew secure enough to be able to plan her liturgy, she began to use colour so that our sense of sight could deepen our experience of the mysteries of salvation, just as incense recruits our sense of smell and music that of hearing. Over the centuries various schemes of colour for feasts and seasons were worked out, and it is only as late as the 19th century that they were harmonized into their present form.