
Fortunately, Mom and Dad have six of us children; imagine if she only had four or two — how many fewer phone calls she would receive! Children are our greatest national treasure, and mothers provide that treasure. But they need the help of fathers…
Motherhood is perhaps the very first act of Stewardship, whereby a person receives a gift and returns it to the giver. To Adam, God gave his most beautiful and precious gift, the woman Eve. Adam is overwhelmed with the gift (“bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh!”). Adam gave himself to his wife, who in her turn gave herself to Adam. In time, Eve gave something even more than herself to Adam — she gave a child to the world (notice that we say “she gave birth to a child” rather than just she “had” a child). But Eve faltered — she jealously kept a part of her womanhood to herself, where it died. But the Blessed Virgin Mary, whom we honor in this month of May, held nothing back.
When I was a teenager, my mother and I used to sit in the garden after dinner and talk about life. There were two chairs by the tomato plants, facing the Blue Mountain Ridge, over which the sun would set in brilliant patterns of deep golds, cool magentas and flaming reds. I would tell her about my day in school, and she would help me interpret it. She would tell me that I was good and would always be God’s son. She had given birth to me, and in those sunset talks, she gave me more: she gave me an identity, a knowledge of myself reflected in my mother’s eyes. Thanks, Mom!