St. Monica
Feast day: August 27
A wife and mother who prayed unceasingly for her family’s conversions, St. Monica is an example for all of us to never give up hope. The mother of St. Augustine, one of the most brilliant writers and philosophers that the Church has ever known, St. Monica prayed for 17 years for his conversion and saw him return to the Catholic faith and be baptized. Born to Christian parents in North Africa in 333, her persistent prayer life and gentle example also influenced both her pagan husband and mother-in-law to become Catholic. Married to a violent and adulterous official, St. Monica was nevertheless able prayerfully to move her husband towards a relationship with God. Many women with their own marital problems confided in her to learn her patient method in bringing their husbands to the faith. Widowed early, St. Monica devoted her life as a single mother of three children to their spiritual welfare. St. Augustine credits his mother for his conversion.
Raised by an elderly servant, St. Monica learned as a child the teachings of sacred Scripture and the importance of having a prayer life based upon receiving the sacraments. At an early age, she also was taught the significance of contributing to the service of her Church community. Still, she married an ambitious and bad-tempered non-believer who tried her strong faith and who taught her how to find the right moment to communicate gently. She lived an unhappy married life made worse by how much her life of prayer and almsgiving annoyed her husband. She was unable to secure her husband’s agreement to baptize any of their children. And yet, St. Monica continued to live her faith openly and share it with others. Due to her patient and kind example, her husband Patricius was converted as was his mother, who had been antagonistic towards Monica due to untrue rumors spread by servants.
St. Monica’s faith was more than prayer and fasting but was emboldened by her persistent action to see her son Augustine converted. Living in grievous sin and holding fast to heresy, Augustine had rejected the Faith his mother had taught him and tried to avoid her. Still, she attempted to remain close to him and be aware of all of the events of his life, to include the birth of his child outside of marriage. St. Monica was ready to disown Augustine, but in a dream it was revealed to her that he would eventually come back to the Faith. So she pursued him to Rome and on to Milan as he traveled by stealth to stay away from her. But it was in Milan that St. Monica met the bishop St. Ambrose, who became her spiritual director and who would later baptize Augustine into the faith.
After 17 years of crying tears in her prayers, St. Monica saw her son return to Christ. Together with Augustine and his son, Monica and some other devoted people moved to the country in Italy to pray and write. St. Monica died before their return to Africa to found a monastic community, but the day before her death, she and her son had a beautiful conversation about the joy of heaven. As St. Augustine recounts in his “Confessions,” “she and I stood alone, leaning in a certain window, from which the garden of the house we occupied at Ostia could be seen; … We then were conversing alone very pleasantly; … forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before … .”
Recalling this profound conversion testimony, Pope Benedict XVI encourages all of us to pray to our Mother Mary:
“St. Monica and St. Augustine invite us to turn confidently to Mary, Seat of Wisdom. Let us entrust Christian parents to her so that, like Monica, they may accompany their children’s progress with their own example and prayers. Let us commend youth to the Virgin Mother of God so that, like Augustine, they may always strive for the fullness of Truth and Love which is Christ: he alone can satisfy the deepest desires of the human heart.”
Reflection
Dear Jesus, thank you for the gift of faith! May I share what you have given me and never lose hope in your love for all.
Prayer
O God, who console the sorrowful
and who mercifully accepted
the motherly tears of Saint Monica
for the conversion of her son Augustine,
grant us, through the intercession of them both,
that we may bitterly regret our sins
and find the grace of your pardon.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,
who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
God, for ever and ever.
