8/27/2021 – St. Monica

Dia dhuit,

St Paul today urges the Thessalonians to make “more and more progress in the kind of life you are meant to live, the life that God wants. “He adds: “What God wants is for you to be holy” i.e. to be more like God, full of love and mercy. Someone who certainly heeded this call to holiness, and also heeded Our LORD’s call in the Gospel to stand ready because we do not know the day nor the hour, was St Monica, who feast day we celebrate today. She was of course the mother of St Augustine (who we celebrate tomorrow) and she unceasingly prayed for his conversion and she also shed many many tears. St Ambrose told her that her prayers and tears would be heard, and indeed they were, with her son becoming a towering figure in the Church. When she was dying she told her two sons not to worry about where she was to be buried. She said: “lay this body wherever it may be. Let no care of it disturb you: this I only ask of you that you should remember me at the altar of the LORD wherever you may be. “All she was concerned about was that St Augustine would remember her at Mass.St Monica, a great saint, knew dear friends, the importance of the Mass for the dead. Let us not forget, following her saintly example, to pray always for the dead and to have Masses offered.

God bless you,
Fr Marius