Mother's Nature

A few months ago, I was having a deep discussion with my children at the dinner table and my oldest son made a statement that gave me pause. He pointed out that most of his friends’ knowledge of spiritual and philosophical belief systems was limited to their own family’s brand of Christianity. What he found worrisome was that they didn’t have any desire to learn about or explore other thoughts or ideas. I wasn’t surprised by his statement, but rather by his realization that our family was different. And I was glad he’d had this revelation.

The truth of the matter is that my own beliefs, including my Unitarianism, Universalism, and Paganism, are the direct result of being a mother. In many ways my spiritual journey began when my sons were very young and my love for them seemed to stand in stark contrast with that of the evangelical patriarchal god of my youth whom I had been taught was quite ready to send his own children to a place called hell. I realized then that I needed to set my old beliefs aside and rebuild from scratch, reexamining everything I had once known to be true. That quest continues to this day and will end, perhaps, when I take my last breath.

Also, as a stay-at-home mom fresh out of college with two preschoolers who were 17 months apart and a husband who worked evenings or nights, I began to seek out any and every excuse for creativity or celebration I could find, mostly to preserve my own sanity. We made sun cookies and danced in a circle on summer solstice when it was too hot to play outside in the San Antonio heat. We planted seeds at spring equinox and collected leaves to make decorations at fall equinox. When we moved to Maryland, we cheered for the return of the sun at winter solstice by making salsa and listening to Tito Puente. Later, as a single mom, these activities merged with new daily dinner rituals to help me to provide stability and continuity in our lives. Then when I remarried, all of these unusual and disparate activities gradually coalesced and evolved into our favorite family traditions and holidays.

In the quiet moments I had to myself when the boys were young, I began to meditate. I also began to practice rituals to mark transitions in my life and to provide comfort during difficult times. For reasons I still don’t fully understand, even though I had never read or seen anything about pagan or Wiccan rituals, from time to time I instinctively began casting circles with candles and other objects and sitting in their midst to build courage and solidify new resolutions and decisions I had made in my own personal growth and development. The first time I attended the women’s ritual circle at my UU fellowship many years later, I was stunned to discover that my rites of passage aligned almost exactly with what practicing pagans were doing.

My evolving beliefs have in turn influenced how I have raised my children. As a UU, I have exposed them to all the ideas and traditions I have discovered from my personal study of world religions. We have made old pagan rituals new and we have made them ours. When the boys graduate from high school in a couple of years, I will continue the Maiden, Mother, Sage (so much better than Crone) cycle by beginning my transition into the Sage portion of my life. If and when my children have children of their own, I have every intention of being that eccentric, fun, and somewhat mysterious grandmother who introduces the next generation of my family to the wonders of nature and the magic of everyday life, much as my children have themselves guided me in my own realization of these miracles.