Let all the earth cry out to God with joy.

We are in that wonderful season of celebration when calendars are filled with graduations, confirmations, first communions and weddings. Families and friends come together laden with gifts and a sense of joy and happiness. Milestones are reached and commitments spoken as preparations come to fruition on the day of celebration.

Today we add Mother’s Day to that list of celebrations.

As I studied the readings for this Sunday it struck me that mothers often do just what the apostles Philip, Peter, and John did. They teach their children about God. They explain who Jesus was, how he lived and died. They also assure their children that Jesus is always there for them as they teach them to pray. They give their children a grounding in the commandments aware that if the basics of the commandments are imprinted on the hearts of their children, they will have given them a gift beyond measure for life.

Two of my grandchildren made their first communions this week – one last Saturday and one yesterday. The joy at each celebration was felt as well as heard as families mingled or sat in excited anticipation waiting for the liturgy to begin. When the children processed down the aisle a quiet sense of reverence set in, and some people dabbed their eyes with tissue. Moms, grandmas and aunties were the most obvious with their emotions. Dads and grandpas were a bit more subtle but by the smiles and looks on their faces there was no doubt they were touched. We were there to witness the innocent faith of the very young, letting them know this was an important day not just for them but for everyone who loved them.

I looked around at the mothers and grandmothers and felt a kinship with them on their journeys to pass the faith on to their children. I didn’t dismiss the dads and grandfathers who make the journey, their influence is important, rather my focus was on the women. Their influence is often what brings and keeps a family connected to a faith community. Women are also the ones running many of the programs and schools that offer religious education and formation. They are modern day disciples following Jesus and sharing the good news.

When we read of the great joy in the city of Samaria today in the first reading it is easy to imagine mothers and grandmothers standing alongside Philip and the others “proclaiming Christ to them”.

On this Mother’s Day let’s offer a prayer of gratitude for our mothers and their mothers and all the ones before them who helped us get to where we are today. Their shared wisdom and faith are part of our wisdom and faith.

Let us do our best to pass all of it on to our children and grandchildren. The outcome of our sharing will not always be as we want or expect but the planting of the seeds of faith will remain with our children and grandchildren, sometimes buried very deep and not evident, but we can trust that God will take care of all of this  in ways never imagined.

Peace,

Anne

My troubled and worried mind encountered the Gospels of John this past week, reminding me to have faith and not to be troubled.

Facing a necessary and disruptive move of homes, searching with no luck to find the next place to live, dealing with mounting anxieties over expenses and a busy, demanding, stressful work situation, I was kicking myself for past decisions. Where was my comfortable, easy life?

Escape, avoidance, and distraction seemed appealing. Attempts to manufacture and plot out my own peace often seem to bring on only more discontent and irritability. While my goal to provide well for my family, and offering them a good and stable life seems like an important priority, I was up in my head and far from my heart, focused on results not going my way and a fear of the future. Impatience and a lack of gratitude prevailed. I was angry and frustrated. To compound it all, I was shaming myself for my glaring lack of gratitude and calmness. 

I was willing to go back to the Gospel and the promise of Jesus: “Do not let your hearts be troubled. Have faith.”

I found, at that moment, a reminder of what is important. A realization that the Lord is with me and within me, and does dwell in my heart, and loves me here, now, even when things don’t appear graceful and life is messy.

Sometimes, it is hard for me to accept fact that I am loved, and that I am capable of loving, and that I am enough. It is in the practice of reading the Gospels that I give myself permission to pause and reflect, and to invite that moment of willingness to see I may be enough.

Somehow I realize I can do the next right, healthy and helpful thing in front of me. That pause of taking time to read the gospels is a grace. It is a pause enough to know that God does dwell in the heart, that I can and have survived my feelings and thoughts, especially the ones that I do not think I should have and to be here in lieu of where I think I should be. 

This was my simple and needed gift of faith. In those moments, the Gospel is for me, as relevant as ever, and it can and will penetrate my fear and what I perceive lacking in myself. I move out of my head and into my heart, where the Lord dwells and is abundantly, spaciously present. Do not be troubled. Have faith. I am here – even in this.

John Baker

John Baker, pictured here with his family, is a not for profit executvie and consultant living in Irvine, California

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