Monica of Hippo

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For the film, see Saint Monica (film)
Saint Monica of Hippo
Widow
Born 332, Tagaste, modern-day Algeria
Died 387, Ostia, outside of Rome
Venerated in Roman Catholic Church and the Lutheran Church
Major shrine Sant'Agostino, Rome
Feast August 27
May 4 (Traditional Roman Catholics and Evangelical Lutheran Church in America)
Attributes depicted as a widow
Patronage patience, married women, homemakers and housewives, mothers, wives, widows, alcoholics, difficult marriages, disappointing children, victims of adultery or unfaithfulness, and victims of (verbal) abuse
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Saint Monica of Hippo (332 – 387) is a Christian saint and the mother of Saint Augustine, who wrote extensively of her virtues and his life with her in his Confessions.

Saint Monica[1] was of Berber descent.[2] She was born at Tagaste (located in modern-day Souk Ahras, Algeria). Her parents brought her up as Christian and married her to an older, pagan man named Patricius. He was a man with a great deal of energy, but also a man given to violent tempers and adultery. Augustine reports that despite the prevalence of domestic abuse at the time, because of her obedience to him, Patricius never beat St. Monica. Furthermore, her mother-in-law was against her and put her into great troubles.

However, St Monica attended church daily and cultivated the virtue of patience. She would say to other women who had bad marriages, "If you can master your tongue, not only do you run less risk of being beaten, but perhaps you may even, one day, make your husband better." She won the favor of her mother-in-law in a short time. Eventually, she converted Patricius to Christianity and calmed his violent nature.

St Monica bore three children, among them Saint Augustine. Augustine made her very happy with his successes as a scholar and teacher, but he also made her very ashamed with his debauchery. For ten years, Augustine lived with his mistress and subscribed to Manichaeism. St Monica sent Augustine to a bishop to be convinced of his errors. The bishop, however, was unable to prevail, and he advised St. Monica simply to continue to pray for her son. He told her, "It is impossible that the son of so many tears should perish."

When her spouse Patricius died, St Monica joined Augustine in Italy. There, some time later, she had the pleasure of seeing her son, at the age of 28, converted, and baptized by Saint Ambrose. Not long after, as she was preparing to return to Africa, she died at the age of 56 at the port of Ostia, telling Augustine: "There was indeed one thing for which I wished to tarry a little in this life, and that was that I might see you a Catholic Christian before I died. My God hath answered this more than abundantly, so that I see you now made his servant and spurning all earthly happiness. What more am I to do here?"[3]

Contents

[edit] Veneration

Her relics were later removed from Ostia to the Church of Sant'Agostino in Rome.

Saint Monica's feast day was inserted into the Roman Calendar in about 1550 and assigned to May 4, the day on which the Augustinians celebrated her, since on May 5 they celebrated the Conversion of Saint Augustine, and the exact date of her death is unfortunately not known.[4] Since the feast of the Conversion of Saint Augustine is not part of the Roman Calendar, it was decided, as part of the 1969 revision of the Roman Catholic calendar of saints, to move her feast to August 27, the day before the feast of her son Saint Augustine that is in the Roman Calendar.[5] Traditional Roman Catholics continue to commemorate her feast day on May 4, which is celebrated as a feast of the III class (see the General Roman Calendar of 1962) or as a Double feast. The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America honors her on May 4. [6] The 1979 Book of Common Prayer of Episcopal Church in the United States of America shows "Monnica, mother of Augustine of Hippo" on the Calendar of the Church Year for May 4 (see Calendar of saints (Episcopal Church in the United States of America)).

Saint Monica is the namesake of a city in western Los Angeles County, Santa Monica, California, which was first visited by missionaries on the saint's feast day. The largest Catholic church in that city is named for Saint Monica, as is the principal Catholic high school.

There are churches in Miami Gardens, Florida; Duluth, Georgia; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; Palatka, Florida; Barre City, Vermont; Berwyn, Pennsylvania; Garfield Heights, Ohio; Chicago, Illinois; Richmond District, San Francisco, California; Tucson, Arizona; New York, New York; and Indianapolis, Indiana named after her.

Also the St Monica Church in Chitungwiza, Zimbabwe is named after her.

Schools named for her exist in:

There is also a Home for the Aged named St Monica's in Dublin Ireland run by the Sisters of Charity. (cf. Dublin Diocesan Directory)

[edit] References

  1. ^ "Monica was a Berber name derived from the Libyan deity Mon worshipped in the neighbouring town of Thibilis, Algeria", Serge Lancel, Saint-Augustin, Fayard, 1999, p. 20, ISBN 2213602824
  2. ^ "Berbers : ... The best known of them were the Roman author Apuleius, the Roman emperor Septimius Severus, and St. Augustine, whose mother was a berber", Encyclopedia Americana, Scholastic Library Publishing, 2005, v.3, p.569
  3. ^ Augustine: Confessions, book 9, chapter 10
  4. ^ Calendarium Romanum (Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 1969), p. 103
  5. ^ Calendarium Romanum (Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 1969), p. 122
  6. ^ Evangelical Lutheran Worship, p. 15, Copyright 2006 Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, published by Augsburg Fortress, Publishers

[edit] Book

  • Englebert, Omer. The Lives of the Saints. Christopher and Anne Fremantle, trans. New York: Barnes & Noble, 1994. Nihil obstat and Imprimatur 1951.

[edit] External links