Gospel text for Mother's Day, 8 May 2016

John 19.25-27       Meanwhile, standing near the cross of Jesus were his mother, and his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple whom he loved standing beside her, he said to his mother, ‘Woman, here is your son.’ Then he said to the disciple, ‘Here is your mother.’ And from that hour the disciple took her into his own home.

Reflection   Although this text is not cited among today's lections it seems particularly relevant for Mother’s Day. Whether or not we are parents, we are faced with the inevitable experience of standing helplessly nearby and watching people in need; young or old, our child or others, people stumble, fall, end up in the ER, are victims of bullies, lose their soccer match, are not chosen for gymnastics team, cry all night in pain, fail the bar exam, are left by their lover, are diagnosed with a chronic disease, do the utterly unthinkable and dare to die in front of us. 

The thing we learn from Jesus’ mother and the other Mary's is, no matter what, we stay. We stay when we see someone carrying the cross of whatever challenge, disability or hardship life hands them. We stay, whether they are our own children or others, because we are sisters and brothers of Jesus, all one in the family of God. We stay because whether we are female or male, whether we have parented a child or not, we stay because we are all children of One God which makes us all mothers of each other.

It may take a moment for some of us to wrap our minds around the notion of being mothers. Perhaps a few Biblical references to God as mother will help. God is known as a mother eagle, “Like the eagle that stirs up its nest, and hovers over its young, God spreads wings to catch you, and carries you on pinions.” God is compared to a nursing mother, “Can a woman forget her nursing child, or show no compassion for the child of her womb? Even these may forget, yet I will not forget you.” (Isaiah 49:15). Lastly, Jesus tells a parable of God as a woman looking for her lost coin, “Or what woman having ten silver coins, if she loses one of them, does not light a lamp, sweep the house, and search carefully until she finds it? When she has found it, she calls together her friends and neighbors saying, ‘Rejoice with me, for I have found the coin that I had lost.’ " (Luke 15:8-10)

The role of mother is not exclusive to female persons given to childbearing. Anyone who expresses compassion, kindness, guidance, protection, comfort, and unrelenting loyalty to another is mothering in the best sense of the word. From his cross Jesus called upon Mary to mother his beloved disciple even as he called upon his disciple to care for Mary as mother. That same charge echoes through the years, calling each of us, who are Jesus’ beloved disciples today, to search relentlessly for every lost or hurting child of God and comfort, care for, teach and encourage, protect and dignify them. 

When we look to the massive problems in our world it is easy to feel paralyzed thinking, “What can I possibly do to make this situation better.” But Jesus does not ask his disciple to change the world of violence in which they were steeped. He asked his disciple to take care of the one person standing next to him. That’s all. What if today we decided to do just that. Like the woman searching for her lost coin, search our community or neighborhoods to find the one person who needs our help and then, like the Mary’s standing at the foot of Jesus cross, stay with them no matter what.

A gift for all of us.... Brahms: German Requiem

While the death of his dear friend Robert Schumann provided an initial impetus for Brahms's German Requiem, the composer dedicated it to his mother, who died nine years later. The memory of Johanna Brahms is particularly apparent in the work’s fifth movement which takes Isaiah 66:13 for its text: “As one whom his mother comforteth, so will I comfort you.”  Click on the image in the upper right area of this post to hear the full Requiem. 

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Gospel text for Sunday 10 May 2015

John 15:9-17        Jesus said to his disciples, "As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father's commandments and abide in his love. I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete.

"This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. No one has greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you. I do not call you servants any longer, because the servant does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything that I have heard from my Father. You did not choose me but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask him in my name. I am giving you these commands so that you may love one another.”

Reflection        On this Mothers’ Day Jesus implores us to “Love one another as (he) has loved us,” a command to love as a mother loves. We need mothers, not only to give us birth but also to give us value, to show us by the way they interact with us that we are a gift, a treasure. How else will be experience ourselves as a precious gift of God? And, not all of us had mothers who were capable of doing that. 

Does that mean we are doomed to a life of self-loathing or endless psychotherapy? I do not think so because mothers are not the only people capable of mothering love.  Which is to say, the mother who gives us birth may or may not be the one who gives us value. And that is where all the rest of us come in. Every one of us is needed by someone to give them a sense of being a treasure, a gift from God.  Unless another human being treats us as a beloved treasure we will not experience the deepest truth of ourselves, that we are beloved. I believe this is why Jesus’ cardinal instruction to the disciples and us is, “Love as I have loved.” Everyone, without exception, needs to be unconditionally loved in order to know they truly are the beloved and every one of us needs to make the decision to love without expectation or motive.

A question before us today is not, “Who is my biological mother?” It is, “ Who is the person that showed me I am a treasure, a precious gift?” For me the answer is, Aunt Frances. My parents were of the belief, “Spare the rod, spoil the child” and that “Children should be seen and not heard.” By contrast, Aunt Frances was tender, kind, spent endless hours listening to me, telling me stories, taking me to special places and letting me know that I was a treasure, beloved. Of course this meant I grew up with competing voices in my head, voices that gave me migraine headaches until a wise psychologist suggested I choose whichever voice was more life giving and banish the other. 

Everyone needs an Aunt Frances; someone who loves them the way Jesus loves, without judgment or agendas, which is why it is essential that every one of us decides to be an Aunt Frances and love the people around us with a selfless mother love, to let the people in our families and neighborhoods know they are valuable treasures, precious gifts of God, beloved. 

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