A Litany in Honor of Women

Response: We offer our prayers, O God.

For women who experience the abundant joys of motherhood as mothers, as grandmothers, as aunts, and as friends.

For women who mother as teachers, as nurses and doctors, as child care workers, as counselors, as artists and craftswomen, and in all the myriad ways in which women mentor those who come after them and share their skills and their compassion with future generations.

For women called to roles other than motherhood, women who lead and serve and follow and care as women of strength and valor in all kinds of ways and thus spread love and strength throughout our word.

For women who experience the sorrows of loss as mothers: women who have been unable to bear or to keep longed-for children, women who have suffered miscarriage, women whose children have died or have vanished into unknown places and futures, women alienated from their children, and women whose children suffer from plights from which their mothers cannot save them.

For women who struggle against addiction, abuse, violence, poverty, oppression, and other experiences which rob them of the fullness of life.

For the mothers who gave us life and who lovingly cared for us, or struggled to care for us, or could not care for us.

For all whose mothers suffer illness or are unable to respond to them, and for all whose mothers have died.

For step-mothers and foster mothers and adoptive mothers, and for all women who step up when mothering is needed.

For the mothers of Nigeria whose daughters have been kidnapped, and for those courageous daughters, and for all who seek to find them and secure their release.

For all the women who teach us what it is to serve, to care, to suffer with dignity, and to reach out with generosity.

For all the women who take to heart the words, “Be the change you wish to see in the world,” and who lead us into new tomorrows.

Another Sad Twist on Mother's Day

I came home yesterday after giving a two-day retreat out of town for my former Presbytery.  One of those events which goes so well and is followed by so many lovely comments that you know you've found your niche.  One of them anyway.  And so I came home, and riffled through the mail, and was startled to see a hand-written envelope among the bills, the return address identifying a family much on my thoughts the past few weeks.

 

Are we somehow forever connected in ways we can't quite grasp to those we meet in the most desperate of circumstances?

 

The card was from the father of my son Josh's former girlfriend, letting us know that his wife died a month ago.  I knew that she had been diagnosed with an aggressive cancer long before that, but my correspondence with her daughter had come to an end, and so I was no longer privy to her unfolding story.  How odd, I emailed him back, that I should have been thinking of them all so frequently in the month since her death.

 

When Josh died, this father braved the trip here across several states to be with his daughter among a crowd of mourning strangers.  Three years later, he sent me one of those letters of such eloquence that you treasure it always, so grateful for someone who has reached out to you to acknowledge a shared sorrow.

 

Only a few months earlier, standing in the Chicago sunshine and then lingering over a breakfast of several hours with the young lady in question and my own daughter, newly returned from Prague, I had imagined that someday this woman and I would be mothers-in-law together.  I imagined the wedding we would plan and the reception we would host.  I imagined our families' continued connections through our children and theirs to come.

 

And then our children broke up, and then my son ended his life, and now the mother-in-law to be has died. We never even met.

 

I am so sorry for their family, for a husband who has lost a life partner of many decades, and for two daughters who have lost their mother, one of them only five years after losing the man she planned to marry.

 

But I ache for myself as well.  I had said a few weeks ago that I just didn't care about Mother's Day angst anymore. I love a little extra time with my surviving children, but with mother and one child missing in action, it's yet one more of the year's sequence of holidays I'd be content to skip.  Still, if other people want to make a big deal of it ~ whatever.    I endure a lot of days that other people find enjoyable.

 

But that was before I was handed yet another twist on this one.

 

I am so very, very sad today, for all that never will be. 

And for all of us, who committed so much and worked so hard and loved so very deeply, only to see the future slip from our grasp.
 

 

Mother's Day

I have always thought of Florida as a magical place.  A place where mothers and children practically live on the beach together.  The top photo, of my mother and youngest brother, was taken at the house on Eugenia Lane in Vero Beach, shortly before my parents finished the house on Azalea Lane, the one designed to become our someday permanent home.  We did move in that May -- and I acquired my first room of my own, the one my mother and I planned to decorate with beach paraphernalia.  Those conversations are among the last with her that I remember.  We returned to Ohio for the summer and fall, and then in October she and baby Dudley were gone.

 

I took the bottom photo on the beach at St. Augustine, our last family trip of probably twenty spent there.  Nighttime -- I wonder whether we were saying good-bye?  We always went out to say hello and good-bye to the ocean, first and last thing.  But the kids' college and job schedules became increasingly complicated, and then Josh was gone.

 

I can't say that I hate Mothers' Day. We gave it short shrift, growing up  . . . It wasn't a day I wanted to celebrate with my stepmothers, and no one pushed it. I suppose my various steps-siblings felt much the same about Fathers' Day, although they were all in possession of actual fathers in other places, so the complexities varied.   When I was a young mother myself, we all celebrated joyfully.    These days, Mothers' Day is not much different from Christmas, or Thanksgiving, or Easter, or all the other holidays, really; difficult to endure, but no longer terrible. And I do have two beautiful living children, whose strength and resilience astonish me every day, and whom I will delight in seeing tonight.

 

Other people have already said all the eloquent things: about lost mothers, and lost children, and women who for one reason or another have not had children, or not been able to raise their children, and the whole messy idea of a day to celebrate mothers. I'll just say this:  the young church secretary dashed into a meeting this past week to show me the "Happy Mothers' Day!" cover she had made for Sunday's bulletin and to ask if it was all right.  I guess the look on my face said it all, because someone else offered, "I guess NOT."  (We decided to go with it.  Everyone else seemed to like it, and my prayer for Sunday covers the rest.)

 

Mothers and children.  The greatest anguish ever.  The greatest joy ever.  That's pretty much my life story.

 

 

 

Mother's Day 2012

Mother's Day Memories

 

Matt and Marissa,  Key West, 2008

 

My momma and my youngest brother, Vero Beach, 1960

 

Josh and his momma, JFK, 2001

The Other Side of Mother's Day

I wasn't going to write this, but I just read a friend's post that is propelling me forward.

Last night I went to a Survivors of Suicide meeting.  I haven't been to one in ages, probably not in two years.  But I'd been feeling a bit overwhelmed since receiving the news that an article I've written about spiritual direction and accompaniment through the experience of grief will be published (eventually) in a journal for spiritual directors. 

I was incredibly excited about the news, and then began to realize that the article, along with the presentation I made last fall to nursing students about caring for families in which a child has suddenly died, and my signing up as a Field Advocate with the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, marks my entry into a new phase of a Life. I. Did. Not. Want.

Suddenly, or perhaps not so suddenly, I find myself moving into the role of one who speaks out, who communicates the the heartbreak, the anger, and the complete devastation of the experience that looks like Yellowstone Park did the year we visited, after the fires.

I wasn't going to say a word about Mother's Day.  Well, I already did, in a misplaced comment on a beautiful piece that someone else wrote on the topic.  But having done that, my plan was to remain silent.  My own Mother's Day will include some moments of genuine joy, as my family is accompanying me to church and The Lovely Daughter is singing, and some overall struggle, as I pastor one of those give-the-ladies-carnations churches.   I would prefer to ignore the day in church completely, and share a quiet evening with my family; I am wishing that I had thought to take the week-end off even after the vacation week that would have taken us away fell through.

Last night, I was reminded of all the reasons for my mixed feelings.  In our little group, two of us will be missing children, one will be without a sister who was also the mother of two young girls, and one without the husband who was also the father of their three very young children.  "It's Mother's Day and it sucks," said one woman through her tears.

Too harsh?  Too much of a downer?  

Here's why I'm writing:  If you are suffering from depression, do not leave this sort of a week as your legacy to your family.  Just.  Don't. 

To leave people via suicide is to cause almost indescribable harm to those you love most.  If you could have heard the conversation of that group of bewildered and damaged survivors last night, you would know that you must do everything you can to recover your health and your one wild and precious life, as Mary Oliver calls it.

We would do it for you if we could ~ we would do anything to save you ~ but we can't.  The terrible irony is that, in such a dark place, you have to mother yourself a bit.  You have to seek the care you need and deserve as someone's beloved child.  If you can't imagine it any other way, imagine yourself as a beloved and beautiful child of the universe, because you are most surely that person.

Mother's Day Litany

NOTE: THIS LITANY COMES FROM A PEARL DOWN UNDER, LINKED BELOW.  ITS AUTHOR IS THE PERSON YOU NEED TO CONTACT FOR PERMISSION TO USE.  (And I am happy to add here some information found on the blog of one of her commenters:  it's by the Rev. Patty Lawrence, May 2004
posted on her blog ~ a pearl downunder
on Saturday, May 7, 2011)

We remember Sarai who was taunted by others in the household because of her inability to have children. 

All-encompassing God, we pray for those who feel excluded when we emphasize one kind of family as normal.

We remember Esther, who was adopted and raised by her cousin.  

God who embraces us all, we pray for those who cannot be raised by their parents, for a short time or permanently.

We remember the mother of Moses, who placed him into a raft on the river.  

Saving God, we pray for parents who struggle to raise their children in oppressive circumstances.

We remember Hannah, who loved her child so much she handed him over to another to raise.  

Loving God, we pray for parents who have placed their child in another family.

We remember Naomi, who grieved the death of her sons.  

God who grieves with us, we pray for parents who mourn the death of a child.

We remember Ruth, who gave up her family to be family to another.  

Inclusive God, we pray for those who choose to be family to those isolated by culture or language or distance.

We remember Elizabeth, who had a child in old age and we remember Mary, who had a child as a teenager. 

Ageless God, we pray that as a community we accept people of varying life stages and responsibilities and relationships.

We remember Rachel, crying for her children.  

God of justice and hope, we pray for those whose children are killed, and look to a time when children can live safely in their communities.

We remember Lois and Eunice, who taught Timothy faith by example.   

Faithful God, we pray for those who teach us faith by their lives; may we remember that we also teach about you in the way we live.

We remember other people, not named in the Scriptures, like the mother of the prodigal son.  

Companion God, we pray for those who wait for a phone call or a visit,  cut off from family and friends by distance and disagreement.  

Nurturing God, we give thanks for those

who enrich our lives by their presence

who teach us about your abundant love

who encourage us to journey in faith.

 

Litany from A Pearl Down Under

Scuplture:  Agia Talassini by Oxana Narozniak, here.