My forthcoming article in the journal Political Theology, “The Camp of God: Reimagining Pilgrimage as Migrancy in Augustine’s City of God 1,” can now be viewed as an e-print (or electronic pre-print) on the Taylor & Francis website.
Check it out here:
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/1462317X.2020.1840036
This article represents the fruit of about four years of labour, since I first began workshopping these ideas back in 2016. After presenting the initial stages of my work at the annual meeting of the American Academy of Religion in November 2016, I turned to other projects, like my recent book on temporality & change in Augustine.
In 2019, I returned to my reinterpretation of Augustine in light of recent theories & theologies of migration. Thanks to some Twitter encouragement from James K.A. Smith, I redoubled my efforts, expanding my original attempt at retranslating Augustine to include a more sustained engagement with thinkers like Agamben, Thomas Nail, Ilsup Ahn, & Peter C. Phan.
In the future, I aim to build on this article by launching a lengthier project rooted in (what I see as) the still-fruitful connections to be drawn between a thoughtful reading of Augustinian peregrinatio & the figure of the migrant today. Given the ongoing plight of many migrant communities around the world, this strikes me as a topic more worthy of pursuit than ever before.