From the Pastor&
      "For I am mindful of the sincere faith
      within you, which first dwelt in your
      grandmother, Lois, and your mother, Eunice,
      and I am sure that it is in you as well."
         2 Timothy 1:5

    Timothy was an assistant to St. Paul in his ministry.  Timothy's father was a pagan, not very helpful in his spiritual development.  However, there was something very beautiful in his grandmother, Lois, and in his mother, Eunice, that Timothy wanted these qualities -- an inner beauty reflected in his Christian life.
    As we celebrate Mother's Day (and parenthood in general), what would our children look like spiritually if they were to reflect their mother or father?  Do they see your inner beauty as Timothy did in his mother and grandmother?
    Remember the Broadway play and movie, A Raisin in the Sun?  There is a powerful scene that I'll never forget.  One day the mother was confronted by the daughter's growing disbelief.  She cynically declared that there was nothing to the idea of the living God, that God did not exist and that people could get along very well without God.
    Following this outburst, the mother, in the quiet beauty of her spiritual integrity, drew herself up and said in a deep, serious voice, "Now you say after me, in my mother's house there is still God."
    There was a pause, and then the girl, with a sudden realization of what her mother's faith had meant to them as a family down through the years, said slowly, "In my mother's house there is still God."
    Mother's Day 2000.  As we think about this holiday, as parents or as single people, it is also a day to think about the great gift of faith, our love of God, and to say to ourselves who live in a very secular culture, "In my house there is still God."
    Being a mother, if that is what God called you to be, is not a position of status but a place of service and surrender to the perfect will of God.  Proverbs 31:25 says of motherhood, "strength and beauty and dignity are her clothing."  When I buried my own mother at the age of 86, she was worn-out, frail, wrinkled, gray and in a nursing home.  But her real beauty and strength were known by her children -- for she shaped us as our mother.
    It's good to give a gift of candy, perfume, and flowers today.  It's good to worship God together and then go out for brunch.  But it's more than that.  Hopefully it's the recognition that "the hands that rock the cradle are the hands that shape the world."
    Happy Mother's Day to you!

-- Fr. Bill