On Mothering

Via Pat Gohn’s new book on women, Blessed, Beautiful, and Bodacious:

A spiritual mother is a yes. But she is neither a doormat nor someone who insinuates herself into someone’s life. She is asked—or she offers—and makes gracious replies in every case. She makes room in her person, in her heart, in her life for other people because she welcomes them as God’s plan for her for the short term or the long term. She trusts God and opens herself to his plans and his people. He initiates it, and she receives it. She leaves the results, or what she may come to bear, to him. In doing so, she brings forth life more abundant than she could ask for or imagine.

She then quotes from Karen Doyle’s The Genius of Womanhood:

Spiritual motherhood means coming alongside and investing in the lives of younger women, through formation, wisdom, support, and encouragement. This is true for the single woman, the woman who is unable to have children of her own, and the woman who is celibate. This task cannot be underestimated. It is vital for all women to be spiritually mothering and mentoring the women who walk with them. In some cultures, older women can feel as if they no longer have anything to offer. This is a great poverty, as they in fact have a whole lifetime of wisdom desperately needed by all women, and indeed the whole world. (Karen Doyle, The Genius of Womanhood [Boston: Pauline Books and Media, 2009], 73)

More from Pat Gohn here. And more to come!