In 332 Monica was born into a Catholic household in Tagaste, a city in modern-day Algeria in North Africa. A maidservant fostered her and instilled in her the values of temperance and obedience. She married Patricius, a Roman civil servant with a terrible temper and a contemptuous attitude toward his wife's religion when she was still young.

Patricius's wife calmly handled his upsetting actions, which included breaking their vows of matrimony. Her sorrow was compounded, though, when he refused to permit their three children—Augustine, Nagivius, and Perpetua—to be baptized. As the eldest Augustine fell ill and was close to death, Patricius approved of his baptism but later revoked it once Augustine recovered.

Patricius was baptized into the Church one year before his death in 371 thanks to Monica's persistent prayers and long-suffering patience. Her eldest son, on the other hand, quickly adopted a lifestyle that caused her much more pain when he fathered a child out of wedlock in 372. He started following the obscure religion of Manichaeism a year later.

In the beginning, Monica avoided her oldest son out of pain and grief. However, she had a strange dream that gave her more faith that Augustine's soul was with him. In the dream, a messenger told her, "Your son is with you." This was around 377. After that, she let him back into her house and pleaded with God to change his ways.

However, this would not occur for a further nine years. Monica asked the local church for guidance in the interim, asking what they might do to convince her son not to follow the Manichean heresy. Monica received assurances from a bishop who had once been a member of that cult that it was "impossible that the son of such tears should perish."

At 29, Augustine abruptly left Monica when she was spending the night in a chapel, which heightened the tears and prayers. Augustine left his mother behind and boarded a ship headed for Rome. Even this sad occurrence would serve God's greater purpose since Augustine departed to become a teacher in the city where he was destined to become a Catholic.

In 384, Augustine rejected the Manichees' doctrine due to the influence of Milan's bishop St. Ambrose. With her son's developing enthusiasm in the preaching of the holy bishop, Monica encouraged herself to follow him to Milan. Augustine was baptized in 387, having struggled against his own passions and perplexities for three years before yielding to God's grace.

Monica had a great mystical experience with God shortly before she passed away, and Augustine wrote about it in his "Confessions." At last, she confided in him, saying, "Son, for myself I have no longer any pleasure in anything in this life. Now that my hopes in this world are satisfied, I do not know what more I want here or why I am here.”

She said to Augustine and his brother Nagivius, "The only thing I ask of you both is that you make remembrance of me at the altar of the Lord wherever you are."

In 387, St. Monica passed away at the age of 56. The St. Monica Sodality, which promotes penance and prayer among Catholics whose children have abandoned the religion, was inspired by her. She is revered as the patron of wives and abuse victims.

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