A Prayer for Mother's Day

Every year on Mother’s Day, I return to this prayer. It’s not one I wrote, though I wish I could thank the person who did. Despite searching, I haven’t been able to track down the original author. Still, the words have carried depth and tenderness that I’ve found myself returning to year after year—especially because they hold space for the wide range of emotions this day can stir. Whether you celebrate, grieve, ache, or give thanks, may this prayer meet you where you are.

Nurturing God, on this Mother's Day we pause to remember the gifts of mothering. And as we remember we pause to give thanks for the ways you are a mother to us: for nurturing us, giving us the guidance and the freedom we need to grow in experience and wisdom (even if we are sometimes headstrong and make unwise choices); for comforting us when we are wounded in body or spirit, helping us to heal and be stronger for it; for believing in and challenging us, calling us to be more than we are, encouraging us to live out our potential; for giving us the swift kick in the backside that we need at times, not letting us coast, reminding us to keep trying and growing; we offer words of thanks.

Gracious God, on this day we also give thanks for those in our lives who have been like mothers to us. Some of them are related to us through blood, some of them have come into our lives through happenstance, some of them have been part of our lives for decades, some of them are new to us, but many people have nurtured, taught, comforted, challenged, encouraged us. Without them we would not be who we are, and so we give thanks for them and all that we have learned from our interactions with them.

And yet, in the midst of our thankfulness, we remember...We remember that there are those for whom Mother's Day is difficult. There are those for whom the relationship between mother and child is strained, or difficult, or non-existent. There are those who are distanced from their mothers, and mothers distanced from their children, by geography, or illness, or unhealed hurts, or communication failures. There are those who have said farewell to mothers or children, not to meet again until we join in the life which lies beyond this life. For all these mothers and children who meet pain or struggle this day we pray for comfort, that they would know they are not alone. On this day also we remember those who want to be mothers but are unable, or those who still carry the wondering of having given up a child for adoption, or those who wish to know the woman who carried them but never will. May they too know your peace.

God of life, today and every day we give thanks for the gifts of life. Today and every day we also remember the people in the world who know more about curses than blessings. Today we remember that the roots of Mother's Day lie in women's grief at burying husbands and brothers and sons as a result of brutal warfare, and so we pray for peace and justice throughout the world. And so, in the spirit of those roots we pray today for that time when we live out Jesus' prayer “That all may be ONE”, for the vision of a truly just society where none are on the outside, for the day when Dame Julian of Norwich’s words “all manner of things be well” have come to full fruition. This we pray in the name of the one who taught about your love, your justice, your hope for the world, Jesus of Nazareth, our rock and redeemer, our teacher and guide, in whose life, death and resurrection we find the path that leads to the Kingdom.

And so, trusting in the One who gives life and bears love into the world, who gathers us in and sends us out, who challenges and comforts, nurtures and calls—we join our voices together, praying as Jesus taught us:

Our Mother, who art in heaven
Hallowed be thy name
Thy Queendom come.
Thy will be done on earth,
As it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our debts,
As we forgive our debtors.
And lead us not into temptation,
But deliver us from evil.
For thine is the Queendom,
And the power,
And the glory,
Forever and ever.

Amen.