The Devouring Mother and Mary the Mother of God

Jordan Peterson has been relentlessly pressured, in no so subtle ways, by Catholics who have recently welcomed his wife into the Church this past Easter Vigil. They are anxiously awaiting an announcement by Jordan that he too has given in and is ready to submit. The fact is that Jordan Peterson himself said he prefers to remain on the edge of things which means he will not be making that announcement that he is becoming Catholic any time soon. Rather than pester him, we ought to pray for his conversion from a distance and listen to and appreciate his dynamic insights on the Catholic Faith. One such insight is that Mary, the Mother of Jesus, provides a model of motherhood which is the opposite of the 'Devouring Mother'.

The 'Devouring Mother' is defined as the pathological version of motherhood. The mother devours her children's potential along with her own fulfillment through overprotection. She fails to let her children grow up, become independent and go out into the sometimes hostile and dangerous world. 

Peterson points out that the devouring mother is preoccupied with protection and safety. Their main objective is to create and manage ‘safe spaces’. They can be fiercely protective to the point that no mercy is shown for anyone who threatens to harm the child. This overprotection results in damage to the child's social-emotional development and psychology.

Many children of devouring mothers fail to grow up and become independent. Some remain in a perpetual state of adolescence with a severe fear of danger and little to no interest in adventure. Jordan Peterson’s insight on this topic has been key for many when trying to understand the problem adults are having in adjusting to adulthood, the delay of marriage and family life and the fear of independence.

Fathers are guilty too. The male counterpart to the devouring mother is the ‘tyrannical father’. He is either absent or abusive. His abdication and submission to the mother of his child leads him to fail to impart a sense of navigating through danger, adventure and the development of self-confidence in the child. The heart of the problem is the failure to arrive at a balance of parental complementarity between both a mother and a father. 

The key to the Holy Family being a model of effective parenting was the complementarity between Joseph and Mary as mother and father.  Mary and Joseph married young unlike today’s youth and they were not pressured to abandon their traditional gender roles as many parents are today.

Tradition tells us Joseph died when Jesus was not yet a man. Nevertheless, Mary continued on her own to keep her maternal influence over Jesus appropriate and balanced according to his age. Peterson says that Mary's example as a mother represents the opposite of the pathology of the devouring mother. She selflessly bore the cost to her reputation by saying yes to unwed pregnancy. She was appropriately protective of the baby at first, nurturing, swaddling and feeding but she was also a risk taker. She laid the baby in the manger, creating healthy separation and preparing for a normal detachment. She allowed the shepherds and gentile magi to get close and touch the child. She not only managed this ‘stranger danger’ but she traveled with Joseph to the unknown, strange destinations such as Bethlehem and later Egypt. 

Jesus was definitely not suffocated by protective bubble wrapping. Mary and Joseph allowed the twelve year old Jesus the freedom to mix in the caravan when they traveled to Jerusalem for the Passover. At first they didn’t even know he was missing. She risked losing him yet she still remained concerned and motherly. She cooperated with Joseph and allowed for him as the masculine role model to assert himself as the leader and teacher of Jesus. Jesus worked under the tutelage of Joseph with sharp tools. He figured numbers, planned projects, fixed and created things with his hands. Mary encouraged him to learn from his father the art of manhood. Jesus later demonstrated and imitated Joseph’s masculine attributes as evident by his fearless confronations with his enemies and his impressive physical strength.

Even during the carrying of the cross Mary kept her distance and remained patient. It wasn’t until the fourth station that she met Jesus and consoled him.

Peterson said Mary’s act of surrender and her act of letting her Son go to the cross was the absolute opposite of being a devouring mother. She willfully gave her Son over to the world to be beaten and killed. She didn’t flee or hide from the gruesome effects of the passion either. Instead, she stood by and remained faithful to Jesus as the mother. She let him be the Savior pouring out love with all the pain and suffering that it entailed until finally she received from the cross the dead body of Jesus on her motherly lap.

Jordan Peterson sees this as the perfect example of motherhood.

"If you're a mother whose worth her salt you offer your son to the world to be destroyed and you say, 'perhaps he will live in a way that will justify that'. The sacrifice of the mother, offering her child to the world, is exemplified by Mary in Michelangelo’s great sculpture the Pieta. Michelangelo crafted Mary contemplating her son crucified in ruins. She’s sitting, with the body of her son is in her arms. He’s broken, and has been destroyed. It’s a very beautiful but very tragic work of genius. A genius level representation. It’s her fault. It was through her that he entered the world and it’s great drama of being. Is it right to bring a baby into this terrible world? Every woman asks herself that question. Some say no, they have their reasons. Mary answers yes voluntarily, knowing full well what’s to come, as do all mothers, if they allow themselves to see. It’s an act of supreme courage, when it’s undertaken voluntarily." - Dr Jordan Peterson.

In a world with a growing number of devouring mothers, we Catholics ought to listen to Jordan Peterson and emulate Mary, the courageous, selfless, giving mother.