Per Christum

Today is Pentecost in the Western Church, and also happens to be Mother’s Day in the U.S. I would suspect that in many evangelical churches, the latter is more celebrated (despite being a secular holiday). Even though I think in liturgical settings the Church calendar should take precedence over secular holidays, I have nothing against Mother’s Day, and will be celebrating it by taking my mother out.

That Pentecost and Mother’s Day fall on the same day this year got me thinking about how celebrating Pentecost is really celebrating a type of motherhood. After all, the birthday of the Church at Pentecost is the celebration of the founding of the Church, the body of Christ, and our symbolic mother. There is a long-held Christian tradition that the Church is our mother. St. Cyprian (3rd century) suggested that we cannot have God as our Father unless we have the Church as our mother. In other words, it is impossible to separate God from the community of believers that he established. The Catechism speaks to Church as mother too:

Salvation comes from God alone; but because we receive the life of faith through the Church, she is our mother: “We believe the Church as the mother of our new birth, and not in the Church as if she were the author of our salvation.” Because she is our mother, she is also our teacher in the faith (169).

The Church, “the pillar and bulwark of the truth”, faithfully guards “the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints”. She guards the memory of Christ’s words; it is she who from generation to generation hands on the apostles’ confession of faith. As a mother who teaches her children to speak and so to understand and communicate, the Church our Mother teaches us the language of faith in order to introduce us to the understanding and the life of faith (171).

Catholics also understand that Mary, the mother of our Lord, is a symbol of the Church as mother. The Catechism states it like this:

At once virgin and mother, Mary is the symbol and the most perfect realization of the Church: “the Church indeed. . . by receiving the word of God in faith becomes herself a mother. By preaching and Baptism she brings forth sons, who are conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of God, to a new and immortal life. She herself is a virgin, who keeps in its entirety and purity the faith she pledged to her spouse” (507).

As the mother of God, Mary is also our mother as well, which the Catechism addresses:

“Mary is “blessed among women” because she believed in the fulfillment of the Lord’s word. Abraham. because of his faith, became a blessing for all the nations of the earth. Mary, because of her faith, became the mother of believers, through whom all nations of the earth receive him who is God’s own blessing: Jesus, the “fruit of thy womb.”

Thus, Catholics have a rather full understanding of motherhood that includes, but goes beyond mere earthly motherhood. The Blessed Virgin Mary, and the Church (itself functioning in faith and humility as did the Virgin Mary), function as mothers to us. So this year, while certainly not forgetting your biological (or adopted) mothers, remember your spiritual mothers as well, the Church, and the Blessed Virgin Mary. Give thanks to the Church, the Blessed Virgin Mary, and your earthly mother, for their prayers, guidance, patience, and love!