Feasts of St Augustine & St Monica

Today is the feast of St Augustine ~ a wonderful saint, who was raised from great sinner to greater saint..by the prayerful tears of a mother....St Monica.

It is a tremendous tribute to the prayers of a mother and as St Ambrose the Bishop advising St Monica said, "A son of so many tears cannot be lost"

Those prayers didn't just save the soul of her son Augustine, no, she raised up a mighty bishop and Doctor of the Church!

So our feast day cake for the family is based on this beautiful reality..a mother's tears and prayers brought forth a saint and bishop!

This sweet involves some cookie and cake making..The lovely image you see above of St Augustine is what I used as the template for cutting out a big cookie, so if you click on the image it will enlarge, save it to your computer and print up ready for cooking.

Here is the cookie already cut out, the template is next to it. Here is my very simple recipe:

Heat the oven to 315F (160C)

Beat together 4 oz (125g) cubed butter and 1/2 cup (125g/4oz) caster sugar until creamy.

Add 1 egg and 1/4 teaspoon vanilla essence and beat well.

Sift 1 cup (125g/4oz) plain flour & 1 cup (125g/4oz) self-raising flour & fold to form a soft dough.

Roll out dough and cut out cookie.

Don't let the dough be too thick or you will end up with a stout St Thomas Aquinas instead!

Bake for 10/15mins until lightly golden. Cool on wire rake until firm.

I also cut out a strip of cookie dough to use as a support behind the St Augustine cookie when sitting on top of the cake.

*If cooking the cakes is enough, and all you can do, just print up the image above onto cardboard instead.

I then cooked up two round, white chocolate mud cakes, I used this recipe which gives me a yummy and moist cake every time. I cut out a template in paper, a tear shape in order to cut the round cakes into individual tear drops.

You can cook one cake only and just cake it in half horizontally, the only reason I cooked two cakes was due to having guests joining us to enjoy it as well.

Each cake is iced with icing made up using icing sugar, butter and water mixed together with blue food dye added to give a pale blue.

I one of the cakes I iced in these words, "A son of so many tears cannot be lost"...I suppose you have guessed by now that these two cakes represent St Monica's prayerful tears.

Here is the finished sweet, I have iced the St Augustine cookie, giving him lovely definition. St Augustine is propped on top of the tear drop that has no writing. The second tear drop is in front with the famous, comforting words of St Ambrose.

This was a very effective symbol for the children to discuss with their friends today. Whose tears are they? Why were they shed? Who said the quote and why? Why is St Augustine standing on top of one of the tears? Why is he in his bishop's vestments?

Placing St Augustine on top of the tears tells us that he was raised to the priesthood and to sainthood through the prayerful tears of his mother.

This was hughly successful, it was a VERY yummy catechetical instruction, to say the least!

It is also a wonderful way to combine these two saints together as they should be.