Saint Monica

St. Monica was married at the age of twenty to Patricias, a pagan official at Tagaste, North Africa. The violent temper and dissolute pagan habits of her husband, caused her such suffering, and made the Christian education of their son rather difficult, but after eighteen years of married life Patricias finally embraced the faith and died soon after. Thenceforth, Augustine, her eldest son, was her sole preoccupation, for during his studies at Carthage, he had become ensnared by the Manichaean heresy, and his passions had led him into an illicit attachment with a woman who became his mistress for the next fifteen years. Monica tried in vain to persuade a visiting Bishop, who had himself passed the Manichean errors, to lead her son back to the truth, but he felt the time was not ripe, and she had to content herself with his assurance "that it is impossible that the son of such tears should perish!"

When Augustine decided to teach rhetoric in Rome, Monica wished to accompany him, but he deceived her and sailed off alone. After leaving Rome, he relocated to Milan, where he secured a professorship. Monica followed him there, where she befriended the great Bishop, St. Ambrose, whose eloquence and sanctity helped Augustine to come into the Church at Easter 387. "My son, I had but one object in life, and that was to see you a Catholic." Monica once said to Augustihne," God has done more than I had dared to hope for in that he has taught you to despise all that the world can offer in order to follow him. Bury my body where you will. All I ask is that you remember me always at the altar of God!" When Monica and Augustine reached Ostia, the port of Rome, to embark for Carthage, she died in his arms, aged 56. Under the patronage of St. Monica, one who knew well how to overcome evil with good, an association of Christian mothers was founded in the nineteenth century in Paris for mutual prayers on behalf of wayward sons and husbands.

Prayer

O Lord, who consoles 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 deeply regret our sins and find the grace of Your pardon.

Jonathan Fabian Ginunggil,

Most High Servant,

Jesus, Mary, Joseph Ministry of Love 

(Blessed and Saints and the Nine Choirs of Angels)