Black Jaque:
As a man, I never quite understood why a woman would feel the need to earn a wage in order to feel valued. When I look at the headlines in the newspaper, it is clear to me that what this country needs most is not better doctors, better accountants, or better lawyers, she desparately needs better housewives!
Interesting. I have found the need to find value in earning money or accomplishing goals (as opposed to building relationships or quietly supporting their families in needs that go beyond the material) far more prevalent among men than among women. The sad thing is that, in trying to gain equality, we women have thirsted for the vanities that infect men.
Black Jaque:
Just think how different things would be if today’s crooks (both white collar and otherwise) had a mother that whupped 'em into line, dragged 'em to daily mass, and drilled into there brains what really matters in life.
Again, this is an interesting take. It is not being forced by one’s mother to be an altar boy that will keep a boy out of prison. I have heard more than one chaplain remark that the most commonly found feature of the childhoods of felons is the lack of a nurturing father or father-figure.
When it comes time for a boy to become a man or for a girl to be confident in commanding respect as a woman, it becomes all too clear that mothers can only do so much.
Black Jaque:
When I get the money together (don’t hold your breath) I’m going to have a figure of a mother and child carved out of a mountain out west somewhere, and I’ll put a big statue of another mother and child situated to cast its monumental shadow right over the statue of Liberty. And my last dollar would be spent erecting a huge marble statue of a woman in an apron, arms folded, with a wooden spoon in hand, situated so her penetrating glare is fixed right on Capital Hill in D.C.
There is no lack of people wanting to put moms on pedastals.
We don’t need that. We need people who want to make meals, do dishes, tuck the kids in, think of what people in their lives need a kind word or a thoughtful gesture, and just in general put their families and their friends before their jobs, their assets, and their resumes.
It doesn’t do any good to cover the landscape in towering granite Madonnas if part of your intent is not to remind yourself to pick up your own clothes, push a vacuum cleaner once in awhile, and add yourself to the list of people who remember birthdays and remark on the progress of budding artists. If you value what mothers do, make it clear that “women’s work” is not beneath you. That is what will change the world.
Remember the Lord’s words to St. Peter: “As a young man you fastened your belt and went about as you pleased; but when you are older you will stretch out your hands, and another will tie you fast and carry you off against your will.” (John 21:18) This is the lot of parents, especially stay-at-home parents, but fathers as well as mothers. Every day, you sign up for that little daily death, not to do your own will, but to do what needs to be done, even though you are tired from all the day has already required of you. To do that, and to do it as a matter of course because of the blessing you have being given by virtue of having others to serve, that is more valuable than all the statues and plaques in the world.
It may well be that you already do all these things. In that case, do not worry that the women in your life have been left wondering about whether you value them. Believe me, they know. I would not be surprised if they are planning a bake sale this minute, in order to erect a statue of
you!
