Year A, Easter 7, May 8 th , 2005
Mother's Day Acts 1:1-14; 1 Peter 4:12-19; St. John 17:1-11
St. Edmund's Episcopal Church
The Reverend George F. Woodward IIII received an e-mail this week which seems appropriate to the day. It was called: EVERYTHING YOUR MOTHER TAUGHT YOU
- My mother taught me to APPRECIATE A JOB WELL DONE: "If you're going to wrestle do it outside; I just finished cleaning!"
- My mother taught me RELIGION: "You better pray that will come out of the carpet!"
- My mother taught be LOGIC: "Because I said so, that's why!"
- My mother taught me MORE LOGIC: "If you fall out of that swing and break your neck, you're not going to the store with me!"
- My mother taught me FORESIGHT: "Make sure you wear clean underwear in case you're in an accident!"
- My mother taught me DISCIPLINE: "You'll sit right there until all that spinach is gone!"
- My mother taught me about HYPOCRISY: "If I've told you once, I've told you a thousand times. Don't exaggerate!"
- My mother taught me SCIENCE: "If you don't stop crossing your eyes, they're going to freeze that way!
- My mother taught me MANNERS: "Stop acting like your father!"
- And finally, my mother taught me about JUSTICE: "One day you'll have kids, and I hope they're just like you!"
In 1908 in West Virginia , one Anna Jarvis began a campaign to establish the national observance of Mother's Day. Her persistence in this endeavor paid off in 1914 when President Woodrow Wilson proclaimed the second Sunday of May each year as Mother's Day.
Anna Jarvis might not recognize today's Mother's Day, a great boon to card shops, florists and the progeny of Ma Bell! Jarvis began her campaign for Mother's Day because her own mother had begun something called Mother's Friendship Day in Grafton , West Virginia . Annual Mother's Friendship Day picnics were held for mothers who had lost their sons in the Civil War, and later, in the Spanish American War. Anna Jarvis wanted to honor her own mother by establishing a day, Mother's Day, that would be a day of prayer for peace. Isn't that a surprise? Ironically, only three months after that First Mother's Day the guns of August unleashed World War I, arguably one of the most costly and senseless wars ever fought.
Today, as we rightly laud motherhood and engage is appropriate sentiment, it might be good for us to remember that the original Mother's Day was a vehicle for proto-feminists to press for greater peace and greater justice. Even as we remind our mothers that we love and cherish them, we might want to remember that this day was originally a cri de couer for a better world, and an acknowledgement of the growing power of women in political discourse. Once again mothers are losing their sons to a war of dubious necessity; not mothers, generally, from our class; but mothers who will be marked by a profound and permanent grief.
The author of 1 Peter says today: "the time has come for judgment to begin with the Household of God." "Household" is the word found in the original Greek, often omitted in English language translations. We are reminded that the way we order our households is of great importance. The household of Faith, and the household of family, which are inextricably intertwined must be well-ordered. Anna Jarvis knew this. I think all mothers do.
The family is the place within society that is most crucial for the formation of character and the transmission of beliefs and traditions. Episcopalians therefore have a vocation and commission from the Lord to raise children in a way that leads them to love God, serve others, and to strive for justice and peace. We are to guard the hearts of our young people and model for them good patterns of living, an increasingly difficult thing to do in our fast paced culture suffused with materialistic goals and driven, often, by values at variance with our Faith.
The discipleship of children must be intentional and purposeful in such a context. We can't expect that children will simply absorb the values and content of Anglican Faith, but we can know with fair certainty that they will absorb the flavor of our general culture. Our culture is too loud and pervasive to resist. It echoes all across the globe, and we reside at the epicenter. We must be intentional in offering balance and counterweight. Teaching and instruction done within the family is the most likely influence to be carried into adulthood, and mothers and fathers know they are the lynchpins for such instruction. "Train a child in the way he should go," says the Book of Proverbs (22:6) "and when he is old he will not turn from it." This passage isn't a guarantee, darn it, but it does reflect the fact that most children will eventually adopt the values, behaviors, and beliefs they were modelled by their parents.
The most important way parents can form their children is by example, a demonstrated consistency between what is said and done.
Not far behind example is the importance of talking about your Faith to your child. They should hear about your belief in Christ, Mothers and Fathers, about basic Christian beliefs, and about how Episcopalians differ from the dominant evangelical creed of American Christians. They should know how highly we value Reason and Conscience, and that we do not read the Bible as fundamentalists do. They should know our Sacraments, our Creeds, and our Book of Common Prayer. The home is the best place for the transmission of such values, better, even, than our excellent Sunday School.
Which brings me to Ritual; an under-rated vehicle for the transmission of Faith, and a great help to busy parents who aren't always quite sure how to proceed with catechetical instruction. A ritual is something that is done daily, weekly or annually. Rituals demonstrate family priorities, establish traditions, provide a sense of security and predictable patterns. As we know at St. Edmund's Nursery School, children thrive on ritual and repetition.
Rituals that can contribute to Christian discipleship include grace before meals, attending Church each Sunday, informal discussions of Faith at the dinner table, seasonal rituals during Advent, Christmas, Lent, and Saint's Days, and bedtime prayers. I like this little Anglican Family Prayer Book by Anne Kitch. Rituals build loyalty and cohesiveness among family members, they become patterns of life through which values are imparted and reaffirmed, and, by virtue of repetition, they are easier for time challenged adults to incorporate into the family system.
Ritual life in a family adapts as children mature, but constancy and stability remain important also for adolescents as they grow in independence and identity. In contrast to the common perception that parents lose influence after early adolescence when kids become beholden to their peers, recent studies affirm that parents have a powerful effect on their children right through the high school years. Social supports, especially perceived caring and connectedness to family, are important factors for high functioning youth. Church commitment serves time and again as one of the most significant markers in the lives of well-adjusted youth.
"The time has come for judgment to begin with the Household of God," I Peter says, somewhat ominously. If Episcopalians are not imparting our values conscientiously and intentionally in our homes, should we be surprised if American culture grows ever more crass, more responsive to those offering easy and absolutist answers in unsteady times, progressively less a city set on a hill offering hope to the larger world? Episcopalians once went to Church with the same frequency as Evangelicals, but no longer. Episcopalians were once thought to be cultural leaders, and, in a diminished sense, we remain so. But if we don't think it important to worship God weekly and teach our children a reasonable Faith to live by, then we should not be surprised when less adequate forms of Faith displace us.
Mothers, you know more than most the truth of Robert Browning's prose when he wrote: "Such ever was Love's way. To rise, it stoops." Love has a servant's heart. It cares so much, it deigns to stoop in self-sacrifice, and so is the most exalted quality we know. We exalt our mothers today because they have loved us, sacrificed for us in ways we will never fully comprehend, and in doing so formed and shaped us to be the people we now are.
The old patriarchy that held sway two hundred years ago on every continent and culture is giving way, in some places at least, to a fresh and equalitarian vision of humanity. Women have more cultural power now than ever before in human history. We need not only to laud our mothers today, but to ask from our mothers leadership in our Church, that we might evolve rituals and patterns of family life that form young people, adolescents and adults alike, that transmit a reasonable and passionate Faith, and resilient values. Anna Jarvis knew that peace was worth praying for; that it was time for a cry of the heart for mothers and sons and daughters and families, and such a time is again upon us. Let's honor today all that family can and should be, embracing the disciplines and rituals of a holy Faith, and living up to standards of the Household of God to which we have been called. Amen. GFW+
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