The comfort of a mother's arms.

The comfort of a mother’s arms when pain becomes unbearable!

As we were growing up and found ourselves in a crisis, no matter how small, our cry to mother was always heard.  Numerating each fall we encountered or a bloody nose that wouldn’t stop, we always knew she was there.  Many times when sons, especially those in war, the first cry for help usually was to their mother.  The memory of how often boys found themselves at the point of a tragic turn in their lives their mother somehow was always there at least in spiritual comfort.  

I like to think as Jesus was dying, hanging on the cross, of the 7 last words he spoke, the one that brought back his childhood days was; “Woman, behold your son,” then to his disciple, “Behold your mother.”  (JN 19: 26 - 27).  The theological premise was more than a suggestion, but it showed the world that when any of us is in the midst of a terrible dilemma our mother still has a touch of love that only a mother can give.  

When the lifeless body of Jesus was taken off the cross, we can only look at the scene of his body being laid across Mary’s lap with the same gesture she had when she nursed his tiny helpless humanity.  Walking in St. Peter’s Basilica and viewing the statue of the Pieta you get a feeling of how much love there was between Jesus and his mother.  But, only a mother could relate to this awesome gesture carved in stone for the world to worship in thought.

The days during Lent remind us of the intense suffering Jesus endured from the moment he found rejection from those he was Incarnated for.  His miracles, as recorded in the Synoptic Gospels and the specific Signs in John’s Gospel presented a picture of his Father’s love to send his Son to save us.  But, the untold years until he was baptized, remain a story of love so deep that no scripture can identify its clarity and faith of a family love that is real.  

Luke has presented us with a kaleidoscope of what families should keep in mind of their own rearing their children.  The presentation in the Temple(Lk 2: 22 -24), fulfilling the Jewish law of purification, there was his mother and step-father, as each family would also be.  Then when the family was in Jerusalem for Passover, Mary noticed Jesus was not with them in the caravan returning home.  Filled with anxiety they returned to the city searching for their absent son.  Finding him they questioned him with a sense of scolding him, and as he grew up he was obedient to his parents.  (Lk 2: 41 ff).

To all women, they are a special part of humanity, and each one has a mother and generations before them.  Motherhood has become the species from which we all derive and their willingness to bear children is the threshold through which each of us will pass into eternity.  For that alone our thanks goes to the future of humanity.  May God’s blessings be on each of them.

Ralph B. Hathaway