About Us
Welcome!
Founded in 1991, St. Monica’s Episcopal Church continues to be a place where all are welcome. Here, people come here to love. You can expect to be warmly received, to find a community where you can grow in God’s Spirit, and be empowered to serve in God’s love.
We are a parish of all ages from varied and diverse backgrounds. We have young families, retired people, and everyone in between. We hope you will find your spiritual home at St. Monica’s Episcopal Church.
St. Monica’s is one of 78 congregations in the Episcopal Diocese of Southwest Florida and is part of the The Episcopal Church in the United States of America and the worldwide Anglican Communion. Formed as a mission of St. John’s Episcopal Church and the Naples Deanery in 1991, St. Monica’s first worship services were held in the community room of the North Collier Hospital and then in an office building near Valewood Drive and Immokalee Road.
What is St. Monica’s about?
As an Episcopal Church, we believe the mission of the Church is to restore all people to unity with God and each other in Christ. The Church pursues its mission as it prays and worships, proclaims the Gospel, and promotes justice, peace, and love. The church carries out its mission through the ministry of all its members. (Book of Common Prayer, p. 855)
Within this framework, St. Monica’s maintains a culture where …
- We warmly welcome all. We affirm the dignity of all humanity through a warm and friendly welcome.
- We connect with the community. We support ministries with our talents, finances, and passions.
- We cultivate a culture that welcomes children and youth, affirming them in their baptismal identity and that they are children of God with gifts to offer to the church.
- Music plays a vital role in our worship and outreach to the community.
- Through prayer, friendship, and community, God’s Spirit heals us.
- Fun is a high value in our community and is woven throughout our congregational life.
- We open ourselves to the Spirit. We have a long history of trying new ventures and ministries. Within the framework of our Episcopal values, we are open to change.
Vestry affirmed this statement in June 2022.
Congregational Covenant
In our baptismal covenant, we are called to “respect the dignity of every human being.”
Pray for one another. That’s not just a throwaway line. Lifting one another to God in prayer is how we learn, slowly and sometimes painfully, but ultimately joyfully, to see each other with God’s eyes, hear each other with God’s ears and love each other with God’s heart. Pray for each other, for our leadership team, and for our wider community.
Endorsed by the Vestry, October 20, 2022
HISTORY
List of Services
-
1991List Item 1
St. Monica’s history begins in 1991 when it was formed as a mission of St. John’s Episcopal Church and the Naples Deanery. St. Monica’s first worship services were held in the community room of the North Collier Hospital and then in an office building near Valewood Drive and Immokalee Road.
-
1994List Item 2
On October 2, 1994, we held the first service in what is now our Parish Hall.
-
2002List Item 3
In 2002, three classrooms were added to our formation wing.
-
2006
In 2006, the Chapel of the Holy Family was named and blessed. The icons of the Holy Family of Jesus and the Holy Family of Monica were commissioned and blessed at the same time.
-
2010
In July 2010, the first worship was held in our new worship space. By then, we’d also added restrooms to two classrooms and enclosed a porch to create a library.
WHO IS SAINT MONICA?
The short answer is that she was the mother of St. Augustine of Hippo, one of the greatest theologians of the church. All that we know about Monica comes from Augustine’s spiritual autobiography,
The Confessions of Saint Augustine.
Monica was born in North Africa about 331 of Berber parents. She was a Christian, and made it her life’s work to bring her husband, Patricius, and her children, Augustine, Nazigius and Perpetua, to the Christian faith.
She was ambitious for her eldest and gifted son, Augustine. He received an excellent education. He did not accept Christianity as a young person, embracing Manichaeism, then Neo-Platonism and living a wild life. He never married but lived with a woman for many years. They were the parents of a son. Monica prayed constantly for his conversion and wept over his sins. A sympathetic bishop once said to her, “Go now, I beg of you: it is not possible that the son of so many tears should perish.”
Augustine left North Africa for a teaching position in Milan. It was there that he met and was baptized by Ambrose in 387.Monica had followed Augustine, against his wishes, to Italy. As she was preparing to return home, she fell ill. She died in Italy. Augustine was worried about her dying so far from home. She responded, “Nothing is far from God, and I need have no fear that he will not know where to find me, when he comes to raise me to life at the end of the world.” Monica died at Ostia, the port city near Rome, in 387.
In 1430, Monica’s remains were transferred from Ostia to Rome, to the Church of St. Augustine. She was proclaimed a saint by popular acclamation, as was the custom at that time, for her pious and holy life.
Prayer for the Feast of St. Monica
O Lord, through spiritual discipline you strengthened your servant Monica to persevere in offering her love and prayers and tears for the conversion of her husband and of Augustine their son: Deepen our devotion, we pray, and use us in accordance with your will to bring others, even our own kindred, to acknowledge Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord; Who with you and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns, one God, for ever and ever. Amen