Good Morning.  I have to apologize to all the men here this morning because my spiritual minute is really for the ladies.  A lot of us sit in the same spot week after week - we are creatures of habit, and it is no coincidence that I sit in the same pew each Sunday.  I sit where the light shines through the window of Mary.

I was touched by a story that Father Ray told on All Saints Day.  It was about a little boy who was asked if he knew who the people were that were in the windows of the church.  His response was, "Those are the people the light shines through."  It wasn't as if I already didn't know why I need that particular light to shine on me every week, but the story somehow made the reason more real.  Then, last Sunday Father Ray told a story about Mary when she was just a girl of 13, and learning she was to be married.  And to find out she is also going to be the mother of the son of God.  It boggles the mind.  Those stories are gifts.  I feel the warmth and stregnth from the light coming through the window of Mary.

At this time of year I join in the celebration of the birth of Jesus, but I also realize that I am rejoincing in his mother's story.  I see the strength and fears, happiness, and sadness that she endured.  My heart is so full of respect and love for the person she was.  

I also have that respect and love for my own mother.  Through the years when I look into her eyes I've seen love, worry, doubts, happiness, fear, disappointments, respect and wisdom.  As many of us have found through our lives, we start to become our mothers.  We teach and endure, worry and regret, love and cherish.  I have had many difficult years as a mother and I wouldn't trade them for anything.  But being a single mom was not easy - it still isn't because our children will always be that - our children.  Even as adults they need to know we are there, as we as adult children need our mothers.  Some of us have lost our mothers from this life, but they remain with us in our hearts, in our gestures, in our speech, and in our laughter.  when I look into my mother's eyes today I see my reflection.  

When I turned forty my mother gave me a beautiful card.  In it was written a poem:

The Joy of Life
The joy of life is living it and doing things of worth,
In making bright and fruitful all the barren spots of earth,
In facing odds and mastering them and rising from defeat,
And making true what once was false and what was bittersweet.
For only she knows perfect joy whose little bit of soil is richer ground than what it was when she began to toil.

Imagine how I felt my mother was applauding me!  My heart ws so filed by her love that day!

Every mother here, and that includes any woman who has let a child into her heart:  Look to that light that shines through that window.  She (Mary) is who we strive to be.

That light shines for us.

Back to Spiritual Minutes Main Page

Last Updated: January 7, 2009
128 Main Street (Rt 10), Easthampton, MA 01027
Tel: (413) 527-0862    Email: info@saintphilipseasthampton.org