Remembering Mothers

May 08, 2015 Editorial

Everyone on earth should celebrate Mother’s Day. It is a special day. It provides an opportunity for us all to pay tribute to mothers and thank them for all their love and support. This Sunday should be no different.
The history of Mother’s Day celebrations can be traced to the Greek annual spring festival which in Greek mythology is dedicated to their maternal Goddess, Rhea. In England, the origins of Mother’s Day began in the 1600s when a “Mothering Sunday” was celebrated to honour Mary Magdalene, the mother of Christ but was later expanded by a religious order to include all the mothers of England.
And in the United States, thanks to the hard work of the pioneering women of their times, Julia Ward Howe, a social activist who wrote the Civil War song the “Battle Him of the Republic” and Anna Jarvis, a Pennsylvania native, Mother’s Day came into existence on May 8, 1914 when President Woodrow Wilson signed a Joint Resolution designating the second Sunday in May as Mother’s Day.
In keeping with a U.S tradition that began in the early 20th century, most of the countries celebrate Mother’s Day on the second Sunday in May, though different societies have devised unique ways to recognize the multifaceted roles and talents of women and mothers.
Millions of people across the globe celebrate Mother’s Day by giving thanks to their mothers for giving them life, raising them and being their constant support. In modern times, Mother’s Day has become tremendously commercialized, and merchants perhaps more so than mothers are the greatest beneficiaries. This contrasts sharply with the intent to conceptualize a special day to honour the work of mothers.
While we celebrate Mother’s Day with our families on Sunday, we should do so with Toya Graham of Baltimore in mind. You may not know her name, but you probably know what she did. A video of Graham went viral during last week’s unrest in Baltimore with her using some rather strong language while punching her 16-year-old son who had defied her orders not to protest the alleged murder of Freddie Gray by the police.
In so doing, Graham, a single mother of six children, had inadvertently not only become a symbol of the struggle but of a good mother who should be honoured on Mother’s Day. But for us to understand what she did, we must first understand that she is a mother who saw her son in danger and was afraid that he could be killed and end up like Freddie Gray. Is that not what mothers are supposed to think and do?
It was her motherly instinct that caused her to use whatever means necessary to protect her son from such an unsafe environment. Her action has ignited anew the role of mothers and women in the family and how it impacts families and society at large. While some hail her as a hero, others criticize her as being too violent and abusive.
She should be commended and celebrated on Mother’s Day for essentially risking her life to remove her son from a dangerous situation and by extension, the commitment of her and most mothers to take care of their children. To the extent that she was violent, it was probably borne out of fear for her son becoming another statistic, but her action shows that she has a deep and genuine love for him and was determined to protect him, even if it meant compromising her own well-being. And so it is with many of our wonderful mothers in Guyana.
Although fathers have their special roles to play in their children’s lives, it is the mothers to whom nature has entrusted the sacred responsibility of nurturing and caring for the young from conception to birth and beyond. Inherent in this relationship is a bond that is as deep and as eternal as life itself, and a sense of duty like no other.
Mothers must not fail; they cannot afford to fail, because usually when they do it spells disaster for the children and, in many cases, the entire family structure as well as society.
We must remember them in so many ways.

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Remembering Mothers

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