Sunday, May 13, 2007

On Mother's Day ...

Mother's Day has always kind of a mixed bag for me. My mother was famous for saying she'd rather have us clean up our rooms all year and skip the flowers and candy. (For the record, I sent flowers and candy again this year and yes, the room could use some picking up! :) And as a parish priest Sunday is a "working day" -- no matter how you look at it -- and so our Mother's Days have worked around that fact for lo-these-many years.
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This year with Jamie in Iraq the best Mother's Day Present of all is just knowing he's OK -- which he is. Called from Kirkuk this afternoon. (Well the BEST would be an end to this crazy war and a new President but I'm trying to be reasonable here!) And my Brian sent along with a very sweet Mother's Day note what I imagine he imagines is what every mother wants: a picture of her boy with his dog and his truck. (Kentucky is turning out to have been a very good move for him!)

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Meanwhile, the canine/feline-kids in our family put together a Happy Mother's Day blog over at Harvey & Luna so everybody is "present and accounted for."
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Finally, in the Mother's Day flurry of flowers and brunches and gifts and cards let's remember that long before there was Hallmark there was Julia Ward Howe's 1870 "Mother's Day Proclamation" that got the whole thing started -- a proclamation that was, at it's core, a proclamation of peace that still speaks to us today:
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Arise then...women of this day!
Arise, all women who have hearts!
Whether your baptism be of water or of tears!
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Say firmly:"We will not have questions answered by irrelevant agencies,
Our husbands will not come to us, reeking with carnage,
For caresses and applause.
Our sons shall not be taken from us to unlearn
All that we have been able to teach them of charity, mercy and patience.
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We, the women of one country,
Will be too tender of those of another country
To allow our sons to be trained to injure theirs.
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"From the voice of a devastated Earth a voice goes up with
Our own. It says: "Disarm! Disarm!The sword of murder is not the balance of justice."
Blood does not wipe our dishonor,
Nor violence indicate possession.
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As men have often forsaken the plough and the anvil
At the summons of war,
Let women now leave all that may be left of home
For a great and earnest day of counsel.
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Let them meet first, as women,
to bewail and commemorate the dead.
Let them solemnly take counsel with each other as to the means
Whereby the great human family can live in peace...
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Each bearing after his own time the sacred impress,
not of Caesar, But of God -
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In the name of womanhood and humanity, I earnestly ask
That a general congress of women without limit of nationality,
May be appointed and held at someplace deemed most convenient
And the earliest period consistent with its objects,
To promote the alliance of the different nationalities,
The amicable settlement of international questions,
The great and general interests of peace.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

HAPPY MOTHERS DAY SUSAN AND LOUISE!
HARVEY & LUNA ARE TRULY BLESSED AND ARE SO BEAUTIFUL, SO ARE THE CATS, THEY LOOK LIKE MY KITTYGIRL (I couldn't figure out a name for her), now she is over 14, she thinks I am her mom, I am hers only, she is first, everything I have, books, clothes, chair, computer everthing is hers, I love her with all my heart and soul, she saved my life, literally, as I had planned on commiting suicide after my partner died of AIDS, downsize/merge of Fortune 100 co. job of 10 years, and much more, then Dolphin (he was 5 when I brought kittygirl home), and he tolerated her, but when he died at 10, she was sad for two years, so God is good and I came through the storm and life is so much better these days.

I too am praying for an end of this Bush hate war of corruption and greed to end.

But, like you said both of your sons are healthy and doing well, so we must have hope and live in the now.

LOTS OF LOVE TO BOTH OF YOU MOMS!!!
And please try not to be hard on Harvey and Luna, they just look so inocent, I can not believe that they would tear anything up, or bring home half living animals, that must be hog wash.......Peace..
Joe Omar Gonzales and Congratulations to all the newly Confirmed, Received and Reaffirmed at All Saints Saturday. Covenant II was a long hall, but well worth it.

Magdalene6127 said...

Susan, a dear friend of mine wrote an editorial about this very proclamation... I highly recommend it. It is on my blog
Peace,

Mags