Dear Monica, Yes, my dear niece, \u201cunanswered\u201d prayers can be hard to endure.\u00a0 Just ask today\u2019s saint.\u00a0 Monica spent over ten years pleading with God through tears and entreaties to bring her wayward son into the Christian fold.\u00a0 At times she spent entire nights in prayer; more often than not, when she allowed herself a few hours of rest she cried herself to sleep.\u00a0 She had grown up a Christian in northern Africa, but had been married to a pagan.\u00a0 Her husband tolerated her faith, though his temper and dissolute living (as well as his mother, who was a most disagreeable person and resided with them) caused her constant grief and difficulty.\u00a0 Eventually, however, her prayers and Christian example won them both over to the faith a year before her husband\u2019s death.\u00a0 At about that time, their eldest son (St Augustine) was finishing up his elite education and notified his mother that he had embraced the Manichean heresy.\u00a0 Nothing could have pained her more.\u00a0 She spared no efforts to save him, taking him on interviews with eminent churchmen, arguing with him herself, disciplining him by taking away family privileges, and always, day after day, year after year, praying for him.\u00a0 Only after she had pursued him to Rome and Milan, where Augustine finally met his match in St Ambrose, was her prayer answered. Actually, I should probably rephrase that.\u00a0 Every one of her prayers before then had been answered as well, with a curt and judicious \u201cNot yet.\u201d\u00a0 We easily forget that God hears all our prayers; in fact, he inspires us to pray them.\u00a0 And he answers all our petitions, but not always in the way we want.\u00a0 If he says yes, we usually know right away and are grateful.\u00a0 If he says no or \u201cnot yet,\u201d we don\u2019t find out until later, and in the meantime we get mad or disillusioned.\u00a0 That\u2019s no way to treat God.\u00a0 However he decides to answer our prayers, we can be assured that his choice is governed by perfect love and infinite wisdom.\u00a0 What more could we ask for? I recommend that you reflect on the lesson St Augustine learned from his mother\u2019s confidence and persistence in prayer.\u00a0 When he left North Africa, he did so in secret, so that his mother wouldn\u2019t go with him (she actually wanted him to stay, because she feared he would drift further away from the truth if he traveled to Italy).\u00a0 Here is a later reflection on the incident: \u201cWhy I left the one country and went to the other, you knew, O God, but you did not tell either me or my mother.\u00a0 She indeed was in dreadful grief at my going and followed me right to the seacoast\u2026 That night I stole away without her; she remained praying and weeping.\u00a0 And what was she praying for, O my God, with all those tears but that you should not allow me to sail!\u00a0 But you saw deeper and granted the essential part of her prayer: you did not do what she was at that moment asking, that you might do the thing she was always asking.\u201d Love, Uncle Eddy<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Dear Monica, Yes, my dear niece, \u201cunanswered\u201d prayers can be hard to endure.\u00a0 Just ask today\u2019s saint.\u00a0 Monica spent over ten years pleading with God through tears and entreaties to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":359,"featured_media":145992,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"default","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"default","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"set","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[3719],"tags":[],"post_folder":[],"class_list":["post-142209","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncle-eddy"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"","pp_force_visibility":null,"pp_subpost_visibility":null,"pp_inherited_force_visibility":null,"pp_inherited_subpost_visibility":null,"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n