Mothering Sunday in the Time of a Virus

Thoughts for Lent IV - Mothering Sunday 2020

It’s rather ironic that the first Sunday on which all our churches are closed for public worship as a precaution against Covid-19 should be Mothering Sunday.

Traditionally, this fourth Sunday in Lent was the day on which people would return to their ‘Mother Church’ (the main church or cathedral of the area) for a special service. This simple form of pilgrimage was actually called ‘going a-mothering’. Domestic servants were given the day off and would usually visit their own families after church.  

For many people, only the latter part of this tradition continues, and ‘Mother’s Day’ is about giving thanks for, and spending time with, our mothers and other family members. For Christians, the religious ‘Mothering Sunday’ and the secular ‘Mother’s Day’ often blend into one, and a visit to Church - where we give thanks for how the church ‘mothers’ (cares for) us and for Mary, the Mother of Jesus - is often followed by a family gathering, where Mums are presented with cards and flowers. 

  

Sadly, the emergence of this new virus and the need to do everything possible to limit its spread has largely scuppered all of this. Instead, there are no public services for people to attend, and family gatherings will be out of the question for many. Inevitably many people will be feeling disappointed and isolated as well as fearful.

I have never experienced anything like this before, and as a priest I’m struggling - as I suspect you are - to get my head around what Holy Week and Easter will feel like without the customary liturgies and celebrations.

As I’ve reflected on this over the last couple of days, I’ve been constantly reminded that Lent is the season when we join with our Lord spiritually in the wilderness, with all the loneliness and the inner struggles and temptations that this involved for him. We usually do this through the sobriety of our services, through discussions in our Lent Groups and in particular devotions such as Stations of the Cross.

This year it seems that this ‘wilderness’ experience is going to be very different, and in some ways, it must be said, much more like the real thing. I’ve always been a believer in turning problems into opportunities wherever possible, and maybe we can do that here.

Perhaps we can try to embrace the painful limitations and privations that we’re now experiencing as a sort of gift – an opportunity to join Our Lord in the wilderness in a whole new way. It will hurt – I’m afraid there’s no getting away from that. The Way of Sorrows - however we travel - does hurt, but we are called to travel on in the belief that this is also the route to the triumph of resurrection; and of course we never travel alone; Our Lord is always with us.

As I pondered what I was going to write here, I looked back to my Mothering Sunday sermon of 2017. It mentioned Khalid Masood’s terrorist attack in Westminster which had taken place only a few days before. I spoke then about how one of the ways that we combat terrorism is to ensure that it’s ‘business as usual’ wherever possible. This is what I went on to say:

For those of us who are Christians, ‘business as usual’ means that we get on with living and loving in the way that Christ calls us to live and love. It means getting on with being the Church. It means getting on with nurturing and caring. It means getting on with consoling others with the faith that consoles us. It means getting on with ‘mothering’.

Whilst ‘business as usual’ in a wider sense may seem a vain hope at present, the Church - locally, nationally and globally – is striving to find different and new ways of continuing to ‘mother’ Christ’s family. It will do so by providing prayer and worship resources for people to use at home; it will do so by showing concern for the most vulnerable and needy through telephone calls to break social isolation or to check how people are; it will do so through acts of kindness like running errands for shopping and so on. All of this may have to be done from a ‘safe distance’, but it can be done if we think creatively. 

So, as we continue our journey through this strange and often frightening new landscape, we should remember that we are in the company of Our Lord who suffered for us and suffers with us, and as his family, we - the church - will continue to care and to ‘mother’ one another at every opportunity, as safely as we possibly can.

In today’s second reading Saint Paul says this:

“God…….consoles us in all our afflictions, so that we may be able to console those who are in any affliction with the consolation with which we ourselves are consoled by God.” (2Corinthians1:4)

May we know God’s consolation and may he show us how best we can console others.  Amen.