Did you know that every mother has a scar? For every childbirth, a mother receives a scar. Did you also know that every true love has a scar? Love is not often as sweet as it sounds or as bright as the color. Think about our Lord and the scars of love on his body. Thomas desired to see the scars of love, not the wounds from the nails and spear.
Love is not as common as people use it in our day and age. Most people mistake love as a feeling, fondness, or attraction. However, love is not ho w you feel or what you say. Love is what you do selflessly for another. You can love deeply without words.
The First Letter of John (1 John 4:7-10) tells us more about God and love. It says, among other things, that “everyone who loves is begotten by God and knows God. Whoever is without love does not know God, for God is love.
In the Gospel of John (15:9-17), our Lord Jesus Christ gives us a practical instruction about love as he states that love’s important duty is to keep the commandments. We could recall that during the last supper, Jesus gave a new commandment to the disciples to love one another as he loves them, and by that act, people will come to know and accept them as his disciples (John 13:34).
How is Love a Mother?
The reality of love as a mother opens the maternal side of God because God is love (1 Jn 4:8). We are familiar with God’s paternal spectrum from various scriptures, including the Lord’s prayer that call’s God “Our Father in Heaven” (Matt. 6:9).
God’s tender nurturance, mostly in the similitude of a nursing woman or a mother bird, shows the maternal side of God. Isaiah (66:13) says, “as a woman comforts her child, so would God comfort His people.” Recall that God asked, “can a woman forget the child at her breast and have no compassion for the child she has borne? (Isaiah 49:15). David says that he will hide under God’s wings until the disaster passes (Psalm 57:1). And Psalm (91:4) says, “He will cover you with His feathers and hide you under His wings.”
Celebrating Motherhood Equals Celebrating Love
The heart of every mother should be a foreground of love. Notice that God decided to send His only Son for our redemption; God chose a woman who later became the human Mother of Jesus Christ, God the Son.
The word that became flesh is love; therefore, Mary carried love in her womb until love was born for us. We cannot fault this logic. Therefore, if Christ Jesus is God in essence, and God is love (1 John 4:8), it means that Jesus Christ is love.
The Blessed Virgin Mary: A Meeting Point of Motherhood and Love
The Blessed Virgin Mary is the perfect example of motherhood. There is no biblical figure that trumps her record as the mother of love. So, in the Blessed Virgin Mary, love meets motherhood in a profound dimension and leaves us with these great lessons.
Tender-Loving-Care: Any woman that lacks these interrelated attributes cannot qualify to be a mother. By the way, you do not need to have a child to be a mother. Motherhood is beyond childbirth. Many wonderful mothers never married nor had kids. Mary’s tender loving care runs from the birth of Jesus in Bethlehem through the time the child Jesus was missing to the foot of the cross.
Understanding heart: An ideal mother understands. Mary had a very deep understanding of God and people. Her encounter with the messenger from God and the visit to her cousin Elizabeth are examples.
Prayerful Intercessor: A prayerless mother is a discordant note to the melody of motherhood. The intercession of Mary at the wedding at Cana in Galilee led to the first miracle of Jesus Christ. Prayerful intercession should be a better alternative to idle talks and gossips.
Unshaken Faith in God: One of the inspired statements of Elizabeth to Mary during her visit is, “Blessed is she who believed that the promise made to her by the Lord will be fulfilled” (Luke 1:45). Nobody is as powerful as a woman of faith who believes in God even when the odds are high.
Moving Forward
As we celebrate Mother’s Day, we remind ourselves that the power of a mother’s love is greater than any force on earth. The world would become a numb place without mothers and the love they bring. Mothers do a lot, we expect so much from them, but we give them little appreciation and attention.
All over the world, there are tombs and monuments for unknown soldiers to celebrate the gallantry of unidentified heroes who gave everything they had to defend their various nations, especially in the world wars.
In the same spirit, Mother’s Day should also celebrate the unknown mothers. Those mothers the world has forgotten but whose selfless tender loving care brought uncommon transformations. We celebrate mothers who loved deeply even to the cost of their lives, and we recommend them to God for eternal reward.
The words of our Lord Jesus at his expiration on the cross remain relevant to us this day, “Behold thy mother!” (John 19:27). At the point of death, our Lord still had the strength to encourage us to pay attention to mothers because of what they represent in life’s journey.
Happy Mother’s Day to all women who love with tenderness and show maternal care. May God bless you all!
Fr. Bonnie.