Being Sensitive About Mother's Day on Mother's Day
in our Churches
...suggestions and a defense for celebrating Mother's Day in the Church
Mother's Day is a day of celebration for many, but not to everyone. For some it is a reminder of their pain and loss.
- The loss of a pregnancy
- The loss of a child to death
- The inability to become a mother
- The loss of a child due to estrangement
- Being the son or daughter of a mother who didn't live up to hype
- Feeling the guilt of giving up a child to adoption or abortion
- Being abandoned or abused by a mother
- Being an adopted child who wonders or grieves over their biological mother
I first became aware of the problem that some have with Mother's Day when a friend confided to me that his wife wouldn't be coming to church on Mother's Day because it was a "little overwhelming for her." They had lost a child in pregnancy and couldn't conceive another. Even as their young pastor and friend, I didn't know the details or the depth of their pain. Many people keep such things private. Until my friend clued me in, I had unwittingly taken part in more than a few "glib" Mother's Day celebrations at church, without making a safe and comforting space for those who needed it most on that day.
We can't always ease other people's pain or help them avoid it. But we can be sensitive to it, help them transform it (perhaps), and at the very least make sure that we are not adding to it or making them feel ignored or excluded.
Some pastors and churches simply ignore Mother's Day or relegate it to a passing remark in a prayer because "it's complicated" or because they deride it as a "Hallmark Holiday," aren't sentimental, have their own "mother issues," or they just don't like the competition "holidays" give them. Funny thing is, they don't have a problem with "sentimental" or "Hallmark" Christmas traditions. Maybe Mother's Day needs to be infused with medieval traditions and hymns.
If births are so important to celebrate in the Church, why would anyone not want to find time to celebrate the key relationships that bring us those births and celebrate the values that nurture the children we so sincerely baptize and pray promises over?If we want children to grow up "in the way they should go," and want to bless married couples "on their way," why not find time to celebrate their role in raising children in the way? The culture around us already has. Why not take the time to celebrate and reckon with parent-child relationships when our members already are? The only serious question is whether or not once a year is enough. And no, it's not enough.
What can we say and do on Mother's Day (and Father's Day) that will pay tribute to the gift and role of Motherhood without heaping coals and ashes onto others?
Here are some thoughts and suggestions I hope will stimulate your own...
1. In the midst of celebrating, we can also acknowledge the pain some people carry about motherhood and their own mother, offer humble pastoral insights, and invite them into prayer.
2. Expand your definition of what a mother "is" on Mother's Day. It can include a grandmother or aunt, a doting father, a teacher, a big sister, a culture that protects children. Mother's Day speaks to the universal hope that every small soul will grow up protected and nurtured by nurturers and comforters in their life. And if they did not find that comfort in their childhood, it can still be found in the deep end of friendships, marriage, and faith.
3. Include notes of grace and confession. All mothers leave a psychological legacy that affects every child no matter how old they are (older adult children included). We honor our mothers by treating them like the children of God that they are (or were). People who are just as broken and as complicated and as imperfect as we are.
We honor our mothers by admitting what we were like as their children, asking forgiveness, and forgiving ourselves. We honor our mothers by becoming the better version of themselves they hoped for in their best moments (a hope almost all parents have). We honor them by asking them about their story and by many other small acts of kindness.
4. Watch your language. Don't be sexist. Motherhood is not "a woman's role." It's not only defined by DNA.
5. Don't single out mothers-with-children either verbally, visually, or with gifts to the exclusion of those without children. Be discreet. Keep the focus on honoring, not applauding.
7. Don't pander to unrealistic descriptions of motherhood. (Mothers themselves will thank you for your honesty, especially if it is delivered with humor.)
8. Remember that some women CHOOSE not to have children, or cannot, but are often just as wonderfully nurturing to others as this world desperately needs. Honor the nurturers, not the plumbing.
9. Raise up the issues in your community that especially affect moms, including wage justice, access to healthcare, child-care, child support, and spousal abuse. Find those who need extra help and give it.
10. Connect the aspirations of motherhood to the example of God "who gave you birth." (Deut 32:18). 
See more motherly images and allusions to God here.
Some helpful resources:
