This is a sermon preached at St Mary the Virgin, Woodford Halse, on Sunday 27 March 2022

The occasion was Mothering Sunday

You can listen to a recording of the sermon here.

Now everyone knows that a good homily has three main points.  But, alas, Mothering Sunday is so rich that I'm afraid there are four main points I must cover.  The first is the motherhood of all human mothers, especially our own and those among us.  The second is the special motherhood of Mary, the mother of Jesus.  The third is the motherhood of God.  And the fourth is the social application of motherhood, peace.

What does motherhood mean?  First, it means sharing in the creative power of God.  Conceiving, carrying, and giving birth to a human being is as close as any person can come to the act of creation.  That is the beginning of motherhood.  But it is far from the end.  Motherhood is also nurturing, sacrificing, loving, and ultimately letting go.  (There is a celebrated story in the Bible, about two women before Solomon, each claiming to be a baby's mother: it is an extreme example of how sometimes loving can mean letting go.  As the real mother found out, sometimes being willing to let go is the only way to hold onto your child.)  In these ways, too, mothers reflect the nature, the actions, and the being of God.  We are grateful to our mothers.  And we are grateful to God for giving us our mothers, and for being the source and font of their motherhood.

The second point to be celebrated today is the special motherhood of Mary.  As she says in her song of praise to God -the Magnificat - "All generations will call me blessed."  Why do we call her blessed?  Because she was honoured with the special privilege of being the mother of Jesus, the Word made flesh, God incarnate.  She was given a great gift.  But is this why we honour her, for being extremely lucky?  Do we honour someone for winning the lottery?  Well, maybe we do, but we shouldn't.  Do we honour Mary for her virginity?  We shouldn't.  It was not at all uncommon for girls her age to be virgins.  No, what makes Mary worthy of honour is her motherhood - and not just the biological part.  God could have used the womb of any one of thousands of Jewish girls of that day.  But motherhood is more than that.  God chose her because he knew she would also do the nurturing, the sacrificing, the loving, and the letting go.  And in Mary's case, this wasn't easy, especially the letting go.  We also honour Mary because she knew all this would be difficult when she agreed to it.  She knew the suspicion and shame her pregnancy would bring upon her.  Being an unwed mother wasn't any easier then than it is now.  Yet she said yes to God, and became the first Christian.  Ordained by God, not man, she was in a very real way the first Christian priest.  After all, she changed bread and wine, ordinary food and drink, into the body and blood of Jesus - in her womb for nine months.  Those of us who have followed her in the priesthood bring Jesus into the world in the form of bread and wine.  Every one of us, all Christians,  a royal priesthood, bring Jesus to the world through our example.  Mary did it in flesh and blood.  And for this, all generations will call her blessed.  But we honour her more for the part of her motherhood that only began in that Bethlehem cave.

The third point of my sermon is the motherhood of God.  We have talked about how mothers, including Mary, share in the creative actions of God.  We have also noted that the nurturing, sacrificing, loving acts of mothers reflect the nature of God.  It follows, therefore, that God's nature includes all the maternal instincts and qualities.

It is also indisputable that God's creative power is complete and undivided.  God even gave some animals (like amoeba) the power to reproduce themselves.  But in others, like man, God divided his creative power between male and female, so that they would have to come together to reproduce.  (By the way, thank you, Lord, for this must agreeable arrangement, this most pleasant plan!) Obviously, God is the source and model of both male and female.

Mothers: be assured, you are made every bit in God's image.  God is love, the Gospel says, and you mothers are the highest created implementation of that love.  You reflect the motherhood of God.

Finally, it is fitting that on Mothering Sunday we reflect on the social application of motherhood - peace.  This aspect of Mothering Sunday is too often ignored, even by the church.  It should not be.  It is central to the whole idea of motherhood, including the motherhood of God.  You mothers know the pain of seeing your children fighting and hurting each other.  Can you imagine the pain of seeing one of your children kill another?  Can you imagine seeing your children divide into opposing armies and slaughter each other?  That's what war is to God.

It is not enough just to set aside a day to honour mothers.  We must devote ourselves to ridding our social institutions of the violence and killing which have caused so many mothers so much pain and grief.  We must try to imbue our institutions, including the church, with the ideals and attitudes of motherhood.  We must strive for a society which reflects the nurturing, the sacrificing, and the loving of mothers.  For then they will also reflect the nurturing, the sacrificing, and the loving of God, the mother of us all.

Finally, I wish to come back to my first point, honouring our own mothers and the mothers of our children for who they are and for what they do.

Since time began, there have been maybe seven billion mothers.  In each case, as with Mary the mother of Jesus, the hardest part is probably the letting go.  Other times, it’s something else.  Every story of motherhood is different.  Each one is valuable.  I’m sure each of you has your own.  Today is a day for remembering those stories.

Mothers, we honour you this day and every day.  We thank you, and we thank God for giving you to us and for endowing you with the spirit of giving, caring, nurturing, loving, and (when necessary) letting go.

+ Let us pray.  God our Mother and Father, rid our hearts and minds of all feelings and attitudes which do not reflect your loving kindness.  Bless all mothers.  Reward them for their sacrifice and their faithfulness to your image.  Give them the strength to endure the pain that often accompanies the task of mothering. 

We thank you for our mothers and for that part of you we have received through them.  Finally, we pray that you will never let us forget the stories which remind us how much our mothers have given us.  We ask this, emboldened by your Holy Spirit, through Christ our Lord.  Amen.