LESSONS FROM A MODEL MOTHER

 

 

        No one can top Mary's example to us of character, purity and submission to God.  When casting about for a model of motherhood, however, she may seem far removed from the challenges we face.  After all, we are sinful, broken people parenting sinful children, usually in greater numbers than she had to deal with.  Yet our hearts long to see in action the imperfect mother of many who has weathered years of storms to leave the world a heritage of godly men and women.

Mother Church is the role model we need.  For two thousand

years she has, as we must do, created external forms, requirements and structures designed to call forth and support the life of her children's souls and their growth in Christ-likeness.  She has handled the tension we feel as we hold simultaneously the highest ideals and standards the world has ever known, but are held responsible for leading to them the little, the weak and the ignorant ones of the world.  Within her family, as in ours, there has always been a diversity of strengths and capabilities.  Her rules had to be at once consistent for all and yet leave room for judgement in the application to each individual, consideration of the context of his actions and his special needs.

        Mother Church has creatively and practically dealt with the paradox between what must be done for the physical, environmental, or temporal needs of her children and what can only be done for them by Christ.  She even has clay feet we can appreciate.  Developing and changing systems and approaches over time, learning from her mistakes, growing stronger and more confident over the seasons of her life - acknowledging herself in constant need of prayer and of God's grace.  What better mother to examine in our own quest to do the best we can in parenting our children?

        Four major characteristics of the way Mother Church raises her children will be our guide.  She prays for them; she holds the highest standards for them; her organization provides order for them; she looks beyond them to the next generations.  These are closely interwoven, inseparable in practice.  My goal is to look through each of these as through a lens, focusing on her model parenting and filtering out practical ways we can apply her lessons in our families.

Mother Church prays for her children.       She prays constantly, systematically, specifically and formally.  She is under no illusion that she can exist in her own strength, but has a system in place to make sure daily prayers are offered for the practical and spiritual needs of her family.  She uses formal language in prayer to draw her children in reverence toward the beauty of communication with God and to link their prayers together across time and space.  This is the answer to the cry of busy, overwhelmed, or despairing parents, "Where do I start to sort out the muddle of our lives?"

        Prayer is the beginning of all work of building, healing and changing.  Little by little we can build on the foundation of regular attendance at Mass, the greatest prayer of the Church.  A morning offering of all our works and trials of the day sets our intentions on the straight path.  Bedtime examination of conscience and prayers of contrition close our day in peace with God and with each other.  Look for opportunities to say Hail Marys or spontaneous informal prayers for others - the passing ambulance, the police or fire station, the harried mom at the grocery store become symbolic calls to prayer adventure with our children.  A weekly or daily family rosary, or a joyful decade together each evening during Advent will live in your children's memories for years to come.

  Prayers for safe travel, grace before meals, prayer during thunderstorms, prayers for healing, blessings for every occasion - you can't add them all at once, or include all the beautiful ones available to you, but be on the lookout for opportunities to make every activity of your life prayerful.  It is not at all unspiritual to use a schedule or plan to remember all the people and needs of concern to your family - teachers, coaches, friends, relatives, schools, priests, neighbors all influence your children and can be ministered to by your family's prayers.  My personal favorite is our family's litany of saints - each parent's and child's patron saint, guardian angels, the patron of our church, and a few others representing our special areas of interest, or need are included.

        Mother Church holds high standards for her children.  It is ennobling to them to have a high expectation for their strength of character and participation in the life of the family.  By setting lofty goals, she says to them, "You are a person of great dignity, value and capability."  This also ensures that they will need to depend on Christ daily and hourly to live up to their calling.  She faces her children's weaknesses without despairing or flinching.  In love for them, she can be honest and find practical ways to meet them at their point of need.  She lowers herself to lift them up, rather than lowering her standards. 

        Mother is 'process' and 'person' oriented.  Process is the bridge between vision and manifestation, between the ethereal and the nitty-gritty, the ideal and the real.  Principles must be given active vehicles for their outworking.  It is not enough for us to love the Lord - we are required to come and worship Him.  The rule propels us to do the right thing when our resolve might be weak; it is hardly necessary otherwise.

        All that you do to teach your children self-discipline helps to strengthen their will, their resolve to do the right thing in many different situations.  You may translate, for instance, the high ideal of family loyalty into a rule that there be no gossiping about each other.  (Parents are often unaware that they are gossiping about their children's faults and misdeeds.  Forming family rules and standards helps parents mature along with their kids.)  Assigning chores and responsibilities trains and equips them to be of practical help to others and to contribute cheerfully to the work of whatever community they live in as adults.  You might have them read biographies of saints to strengthen them by excellent example.  Require a tithe of baby-sitting, or lawn-mowing income; a written essay on particular misconduct, a forfeit of computer game time for poor grades.  In any number of ways, you can not only hold your children to high standards, but help them in the process of development of self control and virtue.

  In our family, name-calling had become a nasty habit and we curbed it by using a form letter to help an offender apologize.  The thought behind it was that, as name-calling wounds by tearing down a person's value, or reputation, in justice our apology should help rebuild their esteem in our own eyes and in theirs.  "Dear ____.  Please forgive me for _____.  I am so thankful that you ______.  One thing I really like about you is _____."  This is just one example of a vehicle that helps us work the ideal into our real life.

        Mother Church is organized, creating a life-support structure for her family and for others.  Many people will remark casually that church is supposed to be an organism, not an organization.  There is a little bit of snobbery in thinking 'structure' is less spiritual than 'life', a false dualism.  In reality, life cannot exist outside structure.  Even the lowest one-celled organisms possess a highly complex structure without which they would die.  Organization is not the antithesis of life, though it must be seen not as an end in itself, but as a means through which life prospers.  Disorder and confusion can be crippling to the life of a family or community. 

        Organization implies clear-headed assessment of resources and good stewardship of them.  Money, time, talents and property are resources.  Children are not.  You care for your children for their own sake, not to get something accomplished with them.  Mother Church is a matrix, a structure within which something else grows and develops - a womb.  The home is the matrix, the space and context, within which your family's life is woven.

        Love, order, beauty, hospitality, frugality, productivity, celebration and law influence children at a deep level - helping to enlarge the soul's capacity for trust , faithfulness, reverence, generosity, temperance, zeal, joy and justice.  Reduce the amount of junk and clutter in your home and in your schedule.  Use some form of calendar system to keep your schedule from becoming a constant source of chaotic contention.  Look for opportunities to work together in charitable giving of your time.  Take time to work out and write down family policies about driving, dating, schoolwork and chores so your family 'legal system' is clear, not arbitrary.  Protect your family time together, keep a date with each other for dinner. 

        The desire to open our home more to friends and strangers was the motivation for our family to get more organized, better at home maintenance and more aware of ways to work as a team.  Hospitality is, for us, a gift we all give together, and a joy we all share.

        Mother Church looks beyond her children to the next generations.  She realizes that much of what she will do in their lifetime is plant seeds that will grow within their families far into the future.  In this light, there is no cut-off age at which it is no longer worthwhile to improve family life, work on development of virtue, or restore broken relationships.  She creates a rich culture and heritage over time, willing to invest herself for long term gains.  Without this perspective we can become mired in the 'terrible daily-ness' of life - chafing against necessary routine and repetition.  We can become driven by the tyranny of the urgent, or seduced by promises of immediate gratification.  The sense of the generations to come and of the eternal orders our priorities toward lasting value, mortification of desire and 'filling' time rather than 'killing' it.

        The traditions and practices of the Church and of families develop and change over time.  Some things need time and adjustments to grow on us and feel authentic, to fit in the spaces of our lives where eternity and time intersect.  As the sense of sacred time begins to overlay and infuse the life of the family, our awareness of the profound significance of the Incarnation is heightened.  Even the physical environment of the Church is (and of our homes, can be) meaning-full, rich in symbolism, sacramental significance and historical connections.  In this way, we learn to look through the real to the ideal, through what is immediate and present to our senses to the transcendent reality thus represented.  Family Christmas traditions, the crucifix and holy water font on the wall, celebrations of baptisms and first communions link us to the universal order of liturgical time. 

        Hand down quilts great-grandma made, keep family photo albums current, and visit the elderly in nursing homes to make generational connections.  Infuse secular traditions with higher meaning - prayers for our country and its leaders on Independence Day, donations to food banks at Thanksgiving, saint stories at Halloween.

        Consider your use of leisure time.  Even, and, in a sense, especially, recreational activities have a capacity for reflecting and strengthening our core values.  Ask whether your activities are filling your time with things that help you focus on truth, beauty and spiritual life, or with those that distract you from goodness of the highest order.   Turn off the TV.  Enjoy the best in music, art, theater and literature.  Poetry helps to train children in the three-dimensional mindedness which deepens the receptivity of the soul to a sacramental view of reality. 

Participate in the arts - make music, draw, create things with your hands, read poetry and books out loud together.  Talk about the spiritual relevance of stories in the news.  Discuss secular shows and movies from the perspective of Catholic morality and concern for the hurting, imperfect world.  Take family trips.  The journey is a metaphor for spiritual growth and progress, and such adventures prepare your children in a special way for going out to face the world. 

        The Church has many roles: ark of the covenant, pillar of truth, upholder of the Word, servant of the needy, just to name a few.  To look at her as Mother is to limit our perspective just enough to see more clearly the lessons she has to teach us in that context.  She is at once universal and personal to each of us.  Truly, as Pope John Paul II asserts in Familiaris Consortio, "The Church thus finds in the family, born from the sacrament, the cradle and the setting in which she can enter the human generations and where these in their turn can enter the Church."

        It is tempting to look for a formula or method by which we can control outcomes and assure our children turn out well, but there is no such thing.  There must be life-to-life transfer from one generation to the next - a process which, by its nature, cannot be finished and closed, or have guaranteed results.  You are the one God has chosen to parent your children.  The life you live will pour into theirs, so follow Mother Church's example and make it a rich one.  Ground it in prayer, guard it with order, purify it by seeking the highest ground of virtue for yourself and your children, and then fill it with celebration, beauty, adventure, and significance.  Invite your children to come along for the joy ride, and welcome them in love to become who they are within the matrix of life you and God have created.