Prayer of Saint Augustine to Saint Monica after her passing

Prayer of Saint Augustine to Saint Monica after her passing

My dear Mother, 

There are no words to describe the immense gratitude I have in my heart for you and who I am now is completely indebted to you. Your passing gives me great sorrow, but my consolation is that this physical separation is only temporal. The spiritual union however, never ceases; and we are especially united in the Eucharist. I am also consoled by the fact that after nine days of severe suffering, you can finally rest in peace. I know that you are now rejoicing with the one who you were closest too and the one you spoke to me so much about. This is why I do not despair. Having watched over me and interceded for me while still here on earth, how much more so will you intercede for me in paradise. 

The Lord was always present in your heart and those around you could see him in you. His gifts in you were also always apparent. You were a great peacemaker; always looking to settle disagreements. Acting as a mediator, you heard both sides of people who were quarrelling and helped them reconcile, always with the greatest discretion and confidentiality. You never spread rumors of others. However, nowhere are the gifts that God gave you more apparent than in your marriage. You had to endure a lot from my father in his infidelity and his ager. Despite all this, you were patient and never uttered an evil word against him. In prayer you discovered the best ways to deal with him and helped other women in their own marriage. You were an example, for my father, of the beauty and presence of God in a person. All this effort was rewarded when, at the end of his life, you gained his soul for the Lord; and you could never complain of all you had endured because the Lord had given you the recompense in his salvation. So, I thank and praise the Lord for his gifts within you and implore him to bestow the same gifts on me. 

From my earliest years you spoke to me about the Lord and all his great works. You sowed in me during those early years the seed of truth which dictated the search of my whole life. It was you that taught me the truth I was seeking for all those years, and it was always inside of me. As a seed needs water to grow, so did I need your prayers for the seed of the authentic truth to flourish within me. You spent your whole life praying for my conversion, and your prayer was not in vain. Through your own experience as a winebibber, you knew that God delivers his children; and you knew that just as God had delivered you, he could deliver me. 

I was around sixteen when I began to stray from the truth that you had taught me, pridefully seeking pleasures, riches, and knowledge. Slowly, but surely, I strayed away from my faith and sought the true elsewhere: not realizing that the truth I sought was already engraved deep within me. You warned me of this and asked me not to go down this road, but I was hardheaded and proud. When I joined the Manicheans, you forbade me from entering your house. I know how much pain this must have cost you. As you later revealed to me, you went to the Bishop and nagged him to confront me, to show me the error of my ways. In this way you remind me of the widow of which Jesus speaks about in Luke 18, who insistently begged for justice. The Bishop, driven desperate by your nagging, told you to have hope because God would surely answer the unceasing prayers and tears; and that someone of my learned and yearning for truth would eventually return to the truth. Your later dream of the angel furthered your hope but also increased your determination. 

When I tricked you and left you to go to Rome and later Milan, instead of abandoning me, you followed me. Through the dangerous voyage you comforted sailors and gave them hope. After finally arriving, you discovered that I had taken my first step towards conversion after listening to the preaching of Ambrose. Instead of rejoicing however, you assured me that the Lord had promised this to you and that you would not die before you saw me a Christian. In the privacy of your heart however, you wept and increased your prayers. My journey continued, though there were many stumbles and setbacks. Finally, when I was baptized and entered into full communion with the Church, you said to me: “Son, for myself, I have no longer any pleasure in anything in this life. What I want here further, and why I am here, I know not, now that my hopes in this world are satisfied. 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 has exceeded this abundantly, so that I see you despising all earthly felicity, made His servant — what do I here?” Soon after speaking these words, you fell ill, and after nine days of suffering, you went home to our Father, to the place where you now sought to be.  

You made me promise not to worry about the things of your burial, but to only take you with me to the altar. This is a promise I will always keep, and it brings me comfort to know that we can be together through the Eucharist. Although this temporary separation is difficult, I know that the difficulty is mine and not yours. For you are rejoicing with the one to whom you spoke the most during your time here on earth. While I know I still have much to do here on earth as reparation for my sins and to reach holiness, I long for the day that we can once again be together with each other and together with the one with whom both of us have fallen deeply in love with. 

Always keep me in your sights as you watch over me, 

Your son, 

Augustine