Here is a portion of the commentaries from The Saint Joseph Sunday missal:
“Pregnancy, birth, choosing a name and baptism (in the Jewish faith, circumcision) are great events for a young mother who goes through this experience for the first time. Only mothers can witness this wonderful time in their lives. Outsiders can only marvel about the beautiful miracle God works in a woman, time and again….
Mary is the mother of Jesus as man, but since Jesus is both God and man, Mary deserves the title of ‘Mother of God,’ just as any woman deserves the title of ‘mother of a medical doctor’ if her son is one….
Notice that Mary did not understand the ramifications of her vocation right from the beginning. Yet in faith her whole life was a repeated ‘May it be done to me according to your word’ (Lk 1:38).”
How beautiful it is that our church dedicated the theme for our Sunday readings, the immediate week after Christmas, and New Year’s Day at that, to the mother.
During our general assembly meeting the other day, Jun Velez, our in-house architect, was relating their family’s gift opening last Christmas eve. The children thought of surprising their mother. One of the children observe that all of them have touch tone cellphone, except their mother (never complaining) who still uses the old type.. So during the gift giving, nobody was giving anything to the their mother. One of them was saying “nakalimotan ko yata (maybe I forgot).” When after all of them had already opened their gifts, one of them brought in a big box for their mother. Only to be surprise again because the box was empty. Inside the big box was a small shoe box, so maybe it’s a rubber shoes, but it was also empty or almost empty…..inside was even a smaller box …. cellphone box …. a gift of love.
Arnel, our admin officer, also shared an incident last Christmas of how they were able to switch a negative situation into positive. They were all set for celebrating Christmas Day together when his wife, who works in a hospital, received a call that she need to relieve someone who got sick. Naturally everybody was disappointed. They were all looking forward to a happy Christmas lunch together. So early on Christmas Day the children saw their mother going to work. One of them suggested, why not they bring the food to the hospital and celebrate there. Why not? So the whole family just before lunch arrived in the hospital. Arnel was saying, “You can just imagine what a happy face they saw in the mother.” They also brought in enough food so that they were also able to invite those who were around to celebrate Christmas with them.
With all these beautiful love story happening in many families how can it fail to make The Lord happy and smile. After all His sacrifice was not without merit.
Here is a part of a poem I wrote for my mother a few years ago:
How beautiful it is to have a mother
How beautiful is a memory of a mother
I noticed that Mama in her late years love white flowers
How beautiful are those flowers these last few days
Let us ask The Lord to put in our hearts an increased appreciation for the role of the mother.
May The Lord’s grace of truth and peace fill our hearts this new year!
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