God Bless All Mothers

Motherhood is challenging, and it is very appropriate to honor them today, on Mother’s Day, and daily. As Catholics, we believe children are God’s blessing, but mothers and all parents need active support. People of faith need to work for the well-being of families.

I was not yet a teen when one evening, my older sisters said, “You know Mummy cried when she found out she was pregnant with you.” I don’t know why they felt I should know that maybe they were trying to cut me down to size a bit. I remember being shocked by the news. I was still too young to understand the challenge my pregnancy was for my mother. It was her seventh. She already had six daughters and had miscarried one child. She was approaching the onset of menopause and must have felt a great deal of fear about bringing my brother and me into the world. A short while later, she heard that her friend, a woman with an even larger family, was expecting too. It gave her courage.

Last month, Jessica Mannen Kimmet wrote an article in America Magazine entitled “Growing Into Motherhood.” In her article, Kimmet expressed her enthusiasm about getting pregnant with her first child. Then, its delivery was difficult, and its after-effects were physically painful. She experienced post-partum depression. What she had expected to be the pinnacle of her life didn’t feel that way. 

“ Where was the goodness I had been promised,” she wrote. Where was the joy with which motherhood was supposed to fill me? I was participating in God’s loving and life-giving work; where was the consolation my faith had always seemed to promise?” Then she remembered, she wrote, “Both can be true at once. Motherhood can be both the best thing I’ve ever done and the hardest. The absence of a fickle human emotion does not equate to the lack of God.” 

She continued, “Motherhood doesn’t always fit into tidy containers. It is, after all, a participation in the life-giving work of an infinite God. My human heart cannot always hold these contradictions in their fullness.” Kimmet wrote that becoming a mother took some growing into. Kimmet continued, “It took time to grow into motherhood; I suppose it still is taking time as my children continue to surprise and stretch me.” Still, she can now become the best possible mother with support from compassionate medical and mental health professionals, prayer, and encouragement. 

I never talked to my mother about what my sisters told me. I feel she regarded the birth of twin sons as an event filled with God’s grace because that is how she let me think about my birth. Catholics need to encourage mothers by supporting them, their efforts to foster childbearing, and their welfare after birth. We need to support tax relief for parents of young children, especially those facing poverty and other challenges, so that every child can grow up in an atmosphere of security and love. On Mother’s Day, don’t just hand them flowers and candy, but help Mothers to parent well by helping in every way possible to support the well-being of families and their growth.