Augustine’s sermons at that time amounted to a direct challenge to the ideology that had rendered the poor invisible to the non-Christian and even to the Christian rich: “Driven crazy by this and puffed up with pride … they even wish to lose their fortunes by giving—giving to actresses, giving to cabaret artists, giving to wild beast hunters, giving to charioteers. They pour forth not only their inherited fortunes, but their very souls. Yet they draw back with disgust from the poor, because the People [the populus—the citizens gathered in the hippodromes and amphitheaters] do not shout for the
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