Rev. Bonita Grubbs.
“Faith Matters” is a column that features pieces written by local religious figures.
Sunday is Mother’s Day.
According to Wikipedia, in 1868, Anna Jarvis, who had previously organized Mother’s Day Work Clubs to improve sanitation and health for both Union and Confederate encampments undergoing a typhoid outbreak, organized a committee to establish a “Mother’s Friendship Day”, the purpose of which was “to reunite families that had been divided during the Civil War.”
She wanted to expand these events into an annual memorial for mothers, but died in 1905 before the annual celebration could be established. Her daughter, who became almost obsessed with her, would continue her mother’s efforts.
Some of us may not know this — I know that, because I did an online search in preparation for this reflection — but its origins were faith-based, established within the St. Andrew’s Methodist Church in Grafton, West Virginia, and became a special day in 1908.
Although the Church is now primarily a shrine and museum, open to the public for tours and events, this day was incorporated in 1962 as the International Mother’s Day Shrine.
To be sure, it was not the celebration as we know it today. Flowers, dinner, cards and hugs (and, perhaps, financial gifts) are now commonplace.
Personally, it has extra special and very personal meaning.
Last year, my dear mother Catherine died at the age of 95. I miss her and attempt to live out the ideals she taught (even doled out a bit of “parental feeding and leading”).
She loved my father and cared for him in his final days. She was an active church member, serving in various capacities, including as an usher, Easter Sunday Breakfast organizer, choir member and on the Board of Trustees.
The only time I saw her speak an unkind word was when I was about 10 years old (a long time ago). She had an encounter with the woman who lived on the third floor who was “in complaining mode” as she ascended up the back stairs to her apartment. I will never forget it.
This particular day, my mother had had “enough.”
She opened the back door and told the woman that she would “beat [her] ass all the way up the stairs.” I could not believe it; my young ears had never heard these words come out of her mouth!
My father had to restrain her, and the woman knew she “meant business.”
For some time after that, the woman took the front stairs to her apartment mostly out of fear that my mother would “keep her word.”
In this reflection, I pay tribute to and honor her for her ministry as a mother, mission of service and melody in music and all that she meant and continues to mean to me. I am who I am because of her.
My mom had a message — of love and care. She also engaged in a ministry of helping. What she did had meaning to her and the people around her, as well as to me.
Do I miss her? Without a doubt.
Every day, I carry her in my heart, mind and spirit as I attempt to follow and live out her example of faith, hope and love because, as I Corinthians 13 states, “But the greatest of these is love.”
It is a love that is shown and lived not just spoken. Sometimes it is tough but not taxing or trying but not without hope. It never fails and ends.
Romans 10:17 says “then faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God;”
I invite you to hear it, speak it, live it and pass it on…because it and faith still matter.
AMEN.
The Rev. Bonita Grubbs is the retired executive director of Christian Community Action.
Previous “Faith Matters” columns:
• Faith Matters: Scar Glory
• Faith (Still) Matters
• Faith Matters: Gaza & Ramadan
• Faith Matters: On Passover & Redemption
• Faith Matters: Freedom Struggles & Holy Week
• Faith Matters: Welcome The Stranger
• Faith Matters: Beyond Neutrality