The Saint Of Today, August 27: Saint Monica, Mother Of St. Augustine. Powerful Supplication For A Grace
Saint Monica, Mother of Saint Augustine: life and prayer
Saint Monica is one of the greatest examples of a Christian woman, wife and mother; thanks to her prayers, St. Augustine converted to Christianity.
The story
Monica was born in 331 in Tagaste, in present-day Algeria, in a lying family; She received a good education and from a young age he read and meditated on the Bible. A Christian woman, cultured and free, therefore, with a heart oriented to spiritual treasures.
What we know about her biography is derived from the writings of Augustine: in particular in the Confessions the great bishop retraces his tortuous, troubled personal history and often speaks to us of his mother.
We know, therefore, that Monica married Patrick and that she gave birth to three children. Her husband was a man of harsh and difficult character, whom she nevertheless knew how to welcome with sweetness and also approach the faith and who was baptized in 371, shortly before her death.
Monica, at the age of 39, found herself alone at the helm of the house, also having to take over the administration of the goods. We know that to her three children the woman passed on Christian education from an early age.
Augustine himself says that he drank the name of Jesus together with his mother’s milk and that he was inscribed, as soon as he was born, among the catechumens.
Growing up, however, came, as is known, the estrangement: the young man took other paths, seduced by the rhetoric and philosophical-religious currents most in vogue in those years, such as Manichaeism, but above all he began an unscrupulous and unregulated life, between Carthage and Rome. This is not why Monica gave up, but continued to accompany her son with love and prayer.
In 385 we find her in Milan, where Augustine taught rhetoric. And it was precisely there that the great change took place: thanks to the preaching of Saint Ambrose, after so many hardships, Augustine embraced the Christian faith, setting out on that path of holiness that we know well today and that has left an indelible mark over the centuries. Monica was present at her baptism in 387.
Since then the two have not separated. Determined to embark on a monastic life, Augustine decided to return to Africa, stopping, as an intermediate stage, in Ostia. It is in this place, in the serene quiet of a home, that spiritual conversations of extraordinary intensity took place between mother and son, which Augustine chose to transcribe and which still today represent a guide for many seekers of God.
There the saint fell ill, perhaps of malaria and in nine days she died, she was 56 years old. It was August 27, 387.
Monica’s tenacity, sweetness and sensitivity make her the patron saint of married women, mothers and widows. (Source santiebeati.it – Author: Lorenzo Montanaro)
Prayer To St Monica
Wife and mother of unspeakable evangelical virtues, to whom the Good Lord has granted Grace, through her unshakable faith before every tribulation and her constant trusting prayer, to see her husband Patrick and her son Augustine converted, accompany and guide us, brides and mothers on our arduous journey towards holiness.
Saint Monica, you who have reached the peaks of the Most High, from above watch and intercede for us who are floundering in the dust among a thousand and a thousand difficulties.
To you we entrust our children, make them a beautiful copy of your Augustine and give us the joy of living with them moments of intense spirituality as you lived in Ostia, to be together where you are.
Collect all our tears, water the wood of the Cross of our Jesus so that abundant heavenly and eternal graces may flow from it! Saint Monica pray and intercede for all of us. Amen!
Source : papaboys.org
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