These past two days, August 27 and 28, we celebrated the memory of Saints Monica and Augustine, mother and son, who assisted one another along the path to holiness of life. Monica was certainly more intentional in doing so. Though long desiring Augustine’s professional and material success, she nonetheless prayed, argued, and wept for his spiritual well-being. “She was twice a mother to me,” Augustine wrote, ” she brought me to birth, both in her flesh, so that I was born into this temporal light, and in her heart, that I might be born into eternal light.” Augustine’s contribution to Monica’s growth in faith and love, on the other hand, was more indirect, precisely due to his stubbornness and waywardness, which made Monica pray all the more and place all her trust in God’s grace, her own influence on her son being insufficient to bring him to the Lord.
