June 22, 2025 - "Saint Monica"

Monica and Patricius had three children.  The eldest was Aurelius Augustinus (Augustine in English).  He was her favorite.  For years she suffered because Augustine did not share her Christian faith.  The suffering was intensified because he was living an immoral life and was heavily involved in the Manichaean cult.  Monica prayed constantly for her son and wept over his sins until a sympathetic bishop (Saint Ambrose of Milan) consoled her: “Go now, I beg of you; it is not possible that the son of so many tears should perish.”

 

Monica’s prayers were finally answered when Augustine was baptized in Milan by Saint Ambrose at the Easter Vigil in 387. Augustine decided to return to North Africa shortly afterwards.  Monica was planning to travel with him.  While they were waiting for a ship to return to Africa, Monica fell ill. While Monica and Augustine were talking about the eternal Wisdom, it seemed, as Augustine recounted later, that they had touched for “just a fleeting moment.” Monica confided that she had no need for further life. “There was one reason and one alone why I wished to remain a little longer in this life,” she told Augustine, “and that was to see you a Catholic Christian before I died.  God has granted my wish…. What is left for me to do in this world?” She died at Ostia Antica (the port of Rome located near the mouth of the Tiber). Her tomb is in the Basilica of Sant’Agostino in Rome.

 

I’ll close this column with the Collect (Opening Prayer) prayed at Mass and at the end of Morning and Evening Prayer on the Memorial of Saint Monica (August 27):

 

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. Amen.

 

Until next week,

Fr. John