Saint Monica Club: How to Wait, Hope, and Pray for Your Fallen-Away Loved Ones

by Margaret Antonetti, Maggie Green

If you have ever loved someone who left the Faith, you know the ache of wanting that person back at the table. You pine for them at Mass, you miss their presence, and even wonder, How could life in Heaven be happy if the one I love is not present? When we feel this ache, the one intimately known to Saint Monica for years, we begin to learn how to love as God loves. In this book, Maggie Green shows how you can faithfully follow the example of Saint Monica, whose prayers, tears, and witness eventually led to the conversion of both her husband and her son, Saint Augustine, Doctor of the Church. This isn't a book on how to win your prodigal child back it's a book on how to wait for them, how to be okay with planting the seeds and laboring in the vineyard without necessarily seeing the harvest. Read these pages, and you'll come to see how the Holy Spirit is at work in each of us, calling us all home and encouraging our witness to each other. We're all part of the Saint Monica Club, praying and petitioning heaven until the day our loved ones return to the Faith and embrace the fullness of life that can only be found in Christ.

Genres: Catholic, Nonfiction

144 pages, Paperback

Published December 1, 2019

Reviews

[Barb · Rating 5 out of 5]

"The Saint Monica Club" will not tell you how to lure someone back to the Church. It will tell you how to live with your own grief, how to bring your loved one to the Lord in prayer, how to connect with others in the same situation, and how to build up the virtues you will need to be the witness your loved one needs. Highly recommended. (Get the print edition - you're going to want to highlight this.) Review copy received from publisher.

[Teresa Kennedy · Rating 5 out of 5]

This beautiful book is a great comfort and reminder that those of us that bear the cross of loved ones far from their faith are not alone. St. Monica prayed for many years for her husband Patricius- who converted on his death bed and her son St. Augustine - who converted and became one of the greatest Catholic theologians. There is hope for all of our prodigal loved ones. We need to pray unceasingly and serve as a model of faith in our lives.

[Nancy · Rating 5 out of 5]

This slim volume is a wonderful resource for parents dealing with the sorrow of children who reject their Faith. There are about 42 reflections, with just a few of them more than 3 pages in length. The book could be read in 1 or 2 sittings, but my recommendation is to read only 1 or 2 reflections at a time, to allow time to ponder and pray with them. As the author states, this is not a how-to-get-your-kid-back-to-church book; it's all about waiting, hoping, praying for your children, and witnessing to them quietly in your actions & the way you love them unreservedly. This is a book to return to, especially in those times when the situation seems hopeless and never-ending.