This Mother's Day,
we’ll give sweet cards,
make long-distance
calls
and buy bunches and bunches of flowers.
Many mothers among us will be honoured and praised and
cheered.
They deserve every bit of that, and a whole lot
more.
But there are some women among us, also mothers,
who
won’t receive cards, or calls, or flowers.
They won’t receive public praise or honor.
No one will stand and
call them blessed.
These mothers are invisible.
They are the women who used to be mothers,
but lost their children
-- to
death, to marital break-ups, to estrangement, to abduction.
They are the women who gave their hearts and lives to raising
one or more children, as best they knew how...
but received rejection in return.
They are the women who tried to become mothers,
but were stymied by
infertility, miscarriage, or "failed" adoption....or all three.
They are the women who gave birth before they were ready to
become mothers...
and placed their child for
adoption,
so their child would have a
mother,
and some other woman would
have a child.
They are the women who were unexpectedly pregnant and chose
to abort their babies...
and have carried secret guilt and
sorrow ever since.
They are the women who dreamed, expected, and longed to be
married and have children,
but for whom God had other
plans.
They are the women who quietly, lovingly, sacrificially mother
other people’s children...
as aunts, as big sisters, as
teachers, as caregivers, as medical practitioners...
but will never be called “mother”,
and long to hear that they're appreciated anyway.
They are the women who are all around us.
We see them every day.
We admire them.
We laugh with them.
We gladly receive what they do.
But somehow, on Mother’s Day,
we leave them in the shadows.
This Mother’s Day,
let's pray God will open our eyes and our hearts,
to see and to applaud,
the love, the sorrow and
the sacrifice
of
all mothers...
even those who are invisible.
