mothers day message
Walter Coleman
OUR MOTHERS RENEW OUR FAITH AND OUR COURAGE –
AND WE WILL DEFEND THEM WITH OUR LIVES!
Sixth Week in the Time of Resurrection
We are in the sixth week of the time of Resurrection. Like the disciples after the crucifixion, we have been gathering and practicing the gifts Jesus left us to remain strong and to regain our spirit in our families and in the struggle for justice. Now this week, we celebrate the gift of assurance – the gift of the mother!
The most hardened prisoner finds his humanity in the promise of the embrace of his mother. Young soldiers in the street turn away from division and in-fighting to defend their mothers. Young girls find their true strength when they come to understand the courage their mothers have had all along. Children face a strange and hostile world with their mother’s hand on their shoulder – and the beginning of even the most hardened of us was as babies, reaching through tears for our mothers to find our smiles and our hopes.
Everywhere we see those who do Satan’s work attacking our mothers and the bond we share with them. We see even now what they do to the Honduran mothers who have made the long journey to apply for Asylum at the border – we see them separated from their children as they wait in detention. We see Palestinian mothers separated from Palestinian children, children imprisoned and separated from their mothers. As the deportations continue, those mothers who were protected by the openings we won from Obama have come again into jeopardy.
For this confidence, for this final assurance in our process of resurrection of these last seven weeks, we turn to the gift of the mother. We look into the faces of our mothers here or in our mind if we are separated from them – and we see through generations of mothers the face of Mary, the mother of Jesus.
In the beginning, when Jesus was born, Mary presented him at the temple where he was blessed by an old man named Simeon who had hung on to life waiting for a savior for his people. Simeon blessed Jesus and then he turned to Mary and said, “a sword will pierce your own soul too.” We see in her face the sufferings of our own mothers.
Then, at the end, when Jesus was on the cross and about to die, he looked down on his mother and the one disciple who had accompanied them to the crucifixion. Then Jesus said: “Woman, here is your son,” and to the disciple, “Here is your mother.” From that time on, this disciple took her into his home.
What a gift! Jesus, on the cross, gave the only one of his disciples who followed him to the cross, the gift of his mother. Think about the mother that Jesus gave to him – and that he gave to all of us.
This was the mother who spoke the words of the Magnificat that have been remembered for centuries:
“The Lord has been mindful of his humble servant” she said. Mary, the mother, does not have to seek prestige or power. She knows that in just being who she is, a mother, that God blesses her and treasures her. She also knows that God blesses the humble people that have sprung from her womb. She says, “He has performed mighty deeds with his arm; he has scattered those who are proud in their innermost thoughts. He has brought down rulers from their thrones but has lifted up the humble.”
Just as Jesus gives this wonderful gift to the disciple he calls on the disciple to treasure her and to protect her. 1500 years later, on the mountain of Tepeyac. in the year in which the Spanish Conquerors had settled their victory over the indigenous people of Mexico, the Virgin of Guadalupe appeared to one of the conquered, Juan Diego. She had features like him and her skin was the same color as his. She stood on the mountain where his people believed the mother of all their Gods lived. Yet she was also Mary, the mother of Jesus, who had ascended to heaven and who came again to the earth to tell Juan that he was her beloved and dignified son. It was the gift of the mother.
So, on this day when we honor all mothers, what is the connection between the mother of Jesus, the virgin of Guadalupe – and the mothers that are here among us?
We know that Mary stayed with Jesus and the disciples on the march to Jerusalem. It was a march that gave hope to the poor and Mary stood as a symbol of assurance to the people with her faith in Jesus. After his crucifixion, it was Mary that went to the empty tomb and Mary and the other women that gave the word to the disciples that Jesus had been resurrected from the dead. What we know is that Mary, the mother of Jesus, and Mary Magdalene, his partner, continued to hold together the disciples as they prepared for the next stage in their ministry, a stage that would see the poor of Israel become migrants and immigrants in many nations. The faith of Mary, the brave words of the Magnificat, remained to uplift the faith of the people in those strange lands. The all-powerful Roman Empire fell – but the people of faith grew stronger!
The Virgin of Guadalupe appeared to Juan Diego as the Spanish Conquistas consolidated their control of Mexico City. While hundreds of thousands were pressed into slavery and hundreds of thousands died of diseases the Europeans brought, the people gathered around the Virgin to form communities of faith which forced finally the Catholic Church to recognize her and the dignity of her people. In time, some Mexican Priests would ride with revolutionary leaders with the flag of the Virgin to finally win independence for Mexico!
In our own experience, as we fought a wicked immigration law to keep our families together, we marched with the Virgin of Guadalupe. In the face of disappointment with the U.S. Congress, we called for resistance and Elvira and Saul and Francisca went into Sanctuary with Guadalupe. That sanctuary became a symbol, the seed of a spiritual movement, that has led hundreds of cities and dozens of states to declare themselves as sanctuary cities and sanctuary states. And to assure us further, Elvira was returned against all odds and Saul has claimed his place here as a U.S. citizen!
Like Mary, mothers today watch as a corrupt, system condemns their sons and daughters to a life of incarceration. The mother of a child killed by gang violence and the mother of a young man locked up – unjustly or justly – for that killing, both cry for their children. Imagine for a moment that there is the same mother for both: Is not the mother’s love the same, are not her tears for both?
We have spent the last few months in scripture, reliving the March of Jesus to Jerusalem, his crucifixion and the seven weeks of his resurrection appearances. We gathered many who had been able to hold their families together and many whose families we had reunited. We brought health care to families that the system ignored – even as tens of thousands died, Our purpose has been to both renew our faith and to make the way ready for this next generation of struggle.
We can get no real justice from the system. We must find a way to defend our young people. Through the mothers, through their tears and suffering, we see the way of reconciliation. Their love for all their children brings us the assurance that each enjoys God’s love and that there is the faith, power and unity to bring reconciliation to our neighborhoods.
Our Mothers Renew Our Faith And Our Courage – And We Will Defend Them With Our Lives!
Faith, it is said, is the belief in things not seen. Yet faith is not a flower that stands alone. Faith, our faith, the faith we are given, is a whole field of beautiful flowers. Remember that the miracle which Juan Diego brought began when the Virgin told him to go pick flowers from a place of rocks where no flowers grew. Yet the flowers did grow there; the flowers brought by the Dark Virgin; the flowers Juan brought in his tilma and released to the Bishop who then fell down in front of the image of the virgin that was left there.
Our mothers – from one generation to the next – are our flowers of hope, our flowers of assurance that God is with us yet. From the wombs of these mothers has come the next generation in our struggle and the faith that shows us the way to become ever more perfectly the people of God.
The gifts that Jesus brought, the gifts of Baptism and Reconciliation and Communion and Prayer and Abundance, these gifts are wrapped in the assurance of the gift of the mother, the gift of Mary, the gift of Guadalupe, the gift of Elvira and Francisca – and the gift of all the mothers here. So today, we bring you roses, for you are the flowers of our assurance that God is with us and will never abandon us. You give us faith. You are our heroes. You are the foundation of the people of God and you are the victory we will claim!
The Holy Scriptures for the Seventh Week in the Time of Resurrection
Luke 1:46-57 Mary’s Song
And Mary said: “My soul glorifies the Lord and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has been mindful of the humble state of his servant. From now on all generations will call me blessed, for the Mighty One has done great things for me—holy is his name. His mercy extends to those who fear him, from generation to generation. He has performed mighty deeds with his arm; he has scattered those who are proud in their inmost thoughts. He has brought down rulers from their thrones but has lifted up the humble. He has filled the hungry with good things but has sent the rich away empty. He has helped his servant Israel, remembering to be merciful to Abraham and his descendants forever, just as he promised our ancestors.”
The Words of the Virgin of Guadalupe to Juan Diego
"Know, be sure, my dearest-and-youngest son, that I am the Prefect Ever Virgin Holy Mary, mother of the one great God of truth who gives us life, the inventor and creator of people. the owner and lord of what is around us and what is touching us or very close to us, the owner and lord of the sky, the owner of the earth. How truly I wish it, how greatly I desire it, that here they should erect Me My Temple! Here would I show forth, here would I lift up to view, here would I make a gift of all My Fondness for My Dear Ones, all My Regard for My Needy Ones, My Willingness to Aid them, My Readiness to Protect them. For truly I Myself, I am your Compassionate Mother, yours, for you yourself, for everybody here in the Land, for each and all together, for all others too, for all Folk of every kind, who do but cherish Me, who do but raise their voices to Me, who do but seek Me, who do but raise their trust to Me. For here I shall listen to their groanings, to their saddenings; here shall I make well and heal up their each and every kind of disappointment, of exhausting pangs, of bitter aching pain. But in order to realize what I have in mind in My Regard for My Needy Ones, do you, please, go to the Palace of the Bishop of Mexico; Go and tell him how it is I Myself who am commissioning you that you should present to him how strongly I desire it that here he should house Me, that here, on the level ground, he should erect My Temple. And give him a full account of all you have seen and wondered at and of whatever you have heard.
John 19:25-27 Jesus Speaks From the Cross
Near the cross of Jesus stood his mother, his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. When Jesus saw his mother there, and the disciple whom he loved standing nearby, he said to her, “Woman, here is your son,” and to the disciple, “Here is your mother.” From that time on, this disciple took her into his home.