One unique practice at Old St. Pat’s
that I have come to appreciate over the years
occurs each year on Mother’s Day
when the community takes a break from male voices
suspends the preaching by celibate men
in order to be nourished by a reflective word
from flesh and blood mothers.
It reminds me of the venerable Spanish proverb:
Una onza de madre vale una libra de clérigos
which roughly translates as
An ounce of mother is worth a pound of clergy.
A poignant enactment of that proverb occurred in 1903
when Pius X’s was elected pope.
He was one of the few in modern history
whose mother was alive to witness that event.
On the day of his coronation
the new pope’s mother was in the front row.
Towards the end of the long ceremony,
Pius X walked to his mother, held out his hand,
and whispered:
“I would like you to be the first to kiss the ring of the fisherman.”
She kissed it, and then she held out her hand with its worn wedding ring.
“Now Joseph,” she said, “you kiss this one.
For if it wasn’t for my ring, you wouldn’t have yours!”
Una onza de madre vale una libra de clérigos.
While do not want to turn the Evangelist
into some kind of anachronistic feminist,
Luke does seem to echo similar wisdom
in these verses from the 1st chapter of his Gospel
Which suggest that an ounce of mother is worth
a pound of the apocalyptic prophets that both of them bear.
This section of Luke’s gospel is quite remarkable
in that for over 30 consecutive verses
no male speaks a word
or even has a leading role in the story.
Maybe this is the real Mother’s Day gospel
as the Church transplants Mother’s Day
from May to December.
In the process, what we sometimes call “Holy Mother Church”
presents these two very tough mothers
as the final images of an enduring advent spirituality.
Sometimes in the commercialization of Mother’s Day,
the romanticization of parenting
overlooks the perilous work of mothering.
From my own experience of being mothered
and from observing sisters, other relatives and close friends,
I have caught a glimpse of the challenges, even pain
of the maternal vocation.
Humorist Erma Bombeck captured this parenting paradox
in her musings about the day God created Mothers, she wrote:
When the Lord God was creating mothers he was into his sixth day of overtime when an angel appeared and said, “you’re doing a lot of fiddling around on this one.”
God said, “Have you read the specs on this order? She has to be completely washable, but not plastic, have 180 moveable parts … run on black coffee and leftovers … have a lap that disappears when she stands up … a kiss that can cure anything from a broken toy to a disappointed love affair and six pairs of hands.”
The angel shook her head and asked, “six pairs of hands?” “It’s not the hands that are causing me problems,” said the Lord. “It’s the three pairs of eyes mothers have to have …. One pair that sees through closed doors when she yells ‘what are you kids doing there?’ when she already knows. Another in the back of her head that sees what she shouldn’t but what she has to. And the ones in the front that can look at a child when she goofs up that say, ‘I understand and love you’ without so much as uttering a word.”
Touching his sleeve gently the angel said, “Go to bed; tomorrow is another day.” “I can’t,” said the Lord. “I’m so close now. Already I have one who heals herself when she is sick, can feed a family of six on one pound of hamburger, and can get a nine year old to stand under a shower.”
The angel slowly circled the mother. “It’s too soft,” she sighed. “But tough,” countered the Lord. “You cannot imagine what this mother can do.”
Finally the angel bent over and ran her finger across the cheek. “There’s a leak,” she declared. “It’s not a leak,” said the Lord, “it’s a tear.” “What’s it for?” asked the angel. “It’s for sadness, joy, disappointment, pain, loneliness and pride.” “You’re a genius” said the angel. But the Lord looked somber replying, “I didn’t put it there.”
While a humorist, Bombeck reveals herself as a perceptive theologian:
understanding, maybe from her own experience,
that mothering – parenting – is the paradoxical combination
of joy and sorrow, laughter and pain, smiles and tears.
Mary and Elizabeth knew both in spades throughout their lives:
Elizabeth living through decades of childless disgrace
Mary accepting a child she did not ask for
facing a future colored with reproach and scorn
for conceiving out of wedlock
and both prevailed with exceptional strength and sanctity:
a strength that Luke captures well
in this mother-centered passage.
Blogger Nancy Rockwell highlights this Lukan sensitivity
in her article “No more lying about Mary,” when she writes:
It’s Advent, and the same old lies about Mary are slipping over pulpits and out of parish letters, Christmas cards, public prayers, and TV holiday movies. The subjugation of Mary, the maligning of her as meek, mild, and mindless, has been harmful to millions of women over many centuries. Hiding within the wonder of Christmas are a thousand years of doctrinal female subjugation, doctrines that, like tinsel, are dripped all over the season of Christmas. In the midst of the celebration of a Wonderful Life, these malicious ideas keep women from feeling empowered, invited to be strong, and urged by God to imagine new ways to live …. In Luke’s account there is nothing submissive nor immature about Mary.
Traveling alone, like every prophet before her, she sets out on her first journey, to … Elizabeth’s house, to declare her agenda. There will be more journeys: to Bethlehem; to Egypt and back; to Jerusalem when Jesus is twelve; and to Jerusalem when [her boy] is crucified.
She gives birth in a barn, lies down with animals, and welcomes weathered shepherds in the middle of the night. She is determined, not domestic; free, not foolish; holy, not helpless; strong, not submissive. She beckons women everywhere to speak out for God’s justice, which is waiting to be born into this world.
Ironically, for all of her passion, strength and even holiness,
she like Elizabeth … and every other parent in the world
cannot protect her child from harm
cannot shield him from attacks and rejection
from repudiation and scorn
nor ultimately from a wholly unjust criminal execution.
What she and a multitude of other mothers do, however,
is continue to believe him
remain devoted to him through triumphs and trials
and ultimately accompany him into death
fearless at the foot of the cross
with a few other women and a boy
as all the guys in his inner circle abandoned him.
The poignancy of caring for children is magnified in a short posting
on a mother’s Facebook page. She writes:
“I was buying Maisy school shoes, and she told me she didn’t want a pair of light up shoes. I figured it was because she’s going into 5th grade and they felt childish to her. Instead she said “What if there’s a lockdown drill or a school shooter? Light up shoes would make me stand out.”
This heartbreaking story underscores the Advent challenge
for women and men everywhere
to speak out for God’s justice
waiting to be born into this world.
As this Advent season comes to a close
and we prepare to remember Jesus’ birth in history
we yet wait for the birth of peace, of safety, of respect,
of care for most vulnerable, especially the children
born and unborn.
This must be our enduring gift to the generations to come.
And in the interim, we stand brave and strong
with Mary and Elizabeth
never abandoning the children … all of the children
no matter what roadblocks obstructs their lives.
The poet Kahil Gibran prophetically and painfully writes:
Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.
You may give them your love but not your thoughts,
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow,
which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams….
You are the bows from which your children
as living arrows are sent forth.
The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite,
and He bends you with His might
that His arrows may go swift and far.
Let your bending in the archer’s hand be for gladness;
For even as He loves the arrow that flies,
so He loves also the bow that is stable.
Mary understood that, embodying holy bending
sacred faithfulness, maternal loyalty
sending her son upon the path of the infinite
even, as the prophet foretold, her heart would be pierced
as she stood by her boy, even in his execution
though unable to shield him from harm.
And so in this season, when so many children’s hopes are high
But sadly so many children have no hope
may her strength sustain us
her constancy inspire us
her friendship support us
and even her pain console us
in the daunting advent work that lies before us,
through Christ our Lord.