Lisa Faith Augustine: Teaching Faith through Photos

By publishing a book designed to catechise within families, Lisa Faith Augustine combined three of her passions: the Catholic faith, photography, and children. She told Günther Simmermacher about how she came to produce her book.

She is known to many Catholics in Gqeberha and regular visitors to The Southern Cross’ digital platforms for her faith-based photography. Now Lisa Faith Augustine has used her skill with images to help parents catechise their children at home.

Her book, A-Z Catholic Conversation Starters, was launched in July, with a foreword by Fr Runaine Radine and an endorsement by Bishop Vincent Mduduzi Zungu of Port Elizabeth. The book is an A-Z of Catholic terms, with one photo per letter of the alphabet, inviting parents to introduce their children to the depicted items and practices, and to reflect on them based on prompts, which are provided in bullet-form text.

As the book’s title suggests, Lisa hopes that her photos and prompts for reflection will initiate conversations about the Catholic faith which may go beyond the 26 themes she has selected.

“I hope that parents with young children, catechetical teams, and even RCIA teams will find both value and use for the book,” Lisa told The Southern Cross. When she showed the draft to the older of her two sons, Tanith (24) and Akita (20), he said: “This reminds me of books from my childhood.”

With these words, Tanith summed up what Lisa had felt to be the purpose of the book.

The self-published book, which Lisa produced almost single-handedly before it went to print, brought together three of her great passions: faith, photography, and children.

“I have so many photos of church and church life, and realised that having them sitting in my gallery was not useful to anyone. So I thought that I should get them out there, and the vehicle I chose was a book — but I still had no idea of what form it would take. Ultimately I decided that I should use the photos to teach.”

A book concept

The concept she arrived at was to curate the selected photos alphabetically. But things did not fall into place immediately, the parishioner of Sacred Heart church in Kabega Park said.

“My target age is pre-readers, and by the time I had populated the entire alphabet with images, I was actually good to go to print. But I was so wrong — the book did not have the soul I felt it needed, so I went back to the drawing board.

I prayed, asking the Holy Spirit to guide me to what eventually ended up in the book,” Lisa recalled.

There were discouraging periods of creative block when she did not even open her laptop for days. “It was just too overwhelming at times. During that time, I thought I might have bitten off more than I could chew. But at some point I forced myself to sit down and face what I had kept putting off, and still imploring the Holy Spirt to take the lead.”

The Holy Spirit did guide Lisa, and soon she had completed her manuscript — but still she felt unsure. “I made an appointment to see Bishop Zungu. He was reassuring, but I left the meeting still uncertain of which way this was going to go. But later I was contacted by his office — with a verbal endorsement! And later the bishop sent a very kind written endorsement, which is included in the book.”

The spiritual direction and keen encouragement from Fr Radine, who is currently based in Rome, and the support of her parish priest, Fr Lubabalo Mguda, were important to Lisa in moving the project forward. She also credits her husband, Kesi, for fuelling her “creativity and perseverance”.

Gratitude to parents

Lisa has dedicated the book to her parents, Lawrence (who is a permanent deacon) and Imelda Augustine, “who saw it fit to make the sacrifices to put four children through private Catholic education in the setting of apartheid South Africa. Being a parent myself today, I have to acknowledge the sacrifices they made,” Lisa said. “This book is also a tribute to Catholic education and the Dominican Sisters who taught me.”

When Lisa was born in the winter of 1972, “my parents, in their wisdom, gave me the middle name Faith, which was also my paternal grandmother’s name. As a child I never told anyone  my middle name; it was only when life took me on an unexpected journey that I emerged embracing the name Faith.” She uses her full name now.

The family attended Our Mother of Perpetual Help church in Malabar, “a parish still close to my heart”. Lisa attended Holy Rosary Convent School from 1978 to 1982, when it merged with St Dominic’s Priory and Marist Brothers. After St Dominic’s Priory, she went to Trinity High School, and then studied psychology at Nelson Mandela University.

Parish all-rounder

Lisa is actively involved in Sacred Heart parish. She is the secretary on the Parish Pastoral Council, a member of the hospitality ministry, a recent addition to the newly-formed church choir, and a contributor to the parish’s social media. And if photographs need to be taken, Lisa is ready to record special events.

Her affection for the camera goes back a long way. “I owe my love of photography and the photographic eye to my dad. In our childhood, he was always poised with a camera, ready to capture a moment. I took on this persona, and I am also always ready with a camera,” Lisa said.

“I always had a camera in my bag at Mass — much to the disdain of some parishioners. And then came the era of cellphone photography, which is somewhat limiting technically, but it has helped me to capture anything at the spur of the moment, without always having to carry a camera.”

The hobby became a mission when her sister Tamara gifted Lisa a Canon DSLR camera. “I was then able to launch Lisa Faith Fotography, which by design is an extension of me. I am still ‘ready-and-armed’, either with my camera or my cellphone, at Mass or just life in general. So it was really inevitable that the setting for the book would be Sacred Heart parish,” Lisa said.

Publishing may well become a new mission for Lisa. “I’m planning more books. I believe that as South Africans, we need more homegrown resources in Catholic catechesis. With that in mind, I shall plot my future publications.”

A-Z Catholic Conversation Starters is available at R300 (plus p&p) from (orders of 10+ are R270 each).

Published in the September 2024 issue of The Southern Cross magazine