What do mothers do all day? They do so much! Often mothers can’t remember all the things they do for the family.

What do mothers do?

Looking from the 5,000-foot level…

• Mothers are the emotional backbones of the family. They provide the holding place for everyone’s feelings and do their best to keep us from being hurt.
• Mom taught you to be a functioning adult. She may have forced you to do your homework, but now you see how important it was. They try not to spoil us.
• When you want to climb the tallest mountain, your mother will make your lunch for you. She is the one who will support your dreams when no one else will.
• Your mother’s smile can make your day a whole lot better no matter how bad.

I wonder! Did all mothers attend the same “three 3M” Mommy School?

Accredited Mommy Schools offer courses teaching mothers the three m’s… how to

• make sense of life,
• model living life
• motivate us to keep the family together.

How did Mary learn to be the Mother of God?

The angel didn’t leave a user’s manual. In her day there was no internet or Alexa. The 3M schools would not be prepared for teaching the once in all history task of being the mother of God.

To make matters worse she was tasked not only with being the mother of God. At the foot of her son’s cross, the most trying of times, she was told that her child-rearing days would never end.

This is the first of a three-part reflection – How we as church can learn from the Three M’s of Mary’s life – how as church do we make sense of life, model living that life, and motivate us as Church to keep the family together and invite others into the family circle.

How Mary made sense of her life…

Pope Francis reminded us

… the Gospel tells us, Mary “kept all these things, pondering them in her heart” (cf. Lk 2:19).

…Let us learn from the Mother of God how to have that same attitude: to keep and to ponder.

…Our expectations clash painfully with reality. That can also happen in the life of faith when the joy of the Gospel is put to the test in troubling situations.

… I ask, brothers and sisters, how do we make this passage, how do we surmount this clash between the ideal and the real? By doing exactly what Mary did: by keeping and by pondering.

Mary “keeps”

Three quotes…

… First, Mary “keeps”, that is she holds on to what happens; she does not forget or reject it.

… She keeps in her heart everything that she saw and heard. The beautiful things, like those spoken to her by the angel and the shepherds, but also the troubling things.

… That is what Mary does. She does not pick and choose; she keeps. She accepts life as it comes, without trying to camouflage or embellish it; she keeps those things in her heart.

Mary “ponders”

Three more quotes…

… she binds together the beautiful things and the unpleasant things. She does not keep them apart but brings them together.

… In her mother’s heart, Mary comes to realize that the glory of the Most High appears in humility; she welcomes the plan of salvation whereby God must lie in a manger. She sees the divine Child frail and shivering, and she accepts the wondrous divine interplay between grandeur and littleness.

…(mother’s go) ”beyond the pain and the problems, (they see) a bigger picture, one of care and love that gives birth to new hope.

Learning to make sense with Mary

• Do I keep the good and the bad in the Church today?
• Can I see a bigger picture of periods of polarization in our history?

Originally posted on Vincentian Mindwalk