Julia Ward Howe

Arise, then, Women of this Day

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / Leave a comment

2013 April 156

Those are the first words of Julia Ward Howe’s Mother’s Day Proclamation.  It was a call to action, not just to American mothers, but to all women in all nations, to come together to create peace between our countries and to repudiate the wars and violence that were being caused and prosecuted mostly by men.

I know that this day is difficult for many people for many reasons.  The word Mother is a difficult word for may people.  Mothers can be cruel or absent or distant or controlling.  Mothers can feel inadequate, captive, unappreciated (but for one day a year), shamed.  Motherhood may be elusive or greatly desired but seemingly unattainable.  Beloved mothers may be gone too soon, too soon.  My first memory of my own experience of being a mother was the Mothers Day ten years ago when I learned that my first pregnancy was failing.

Today, if this day is difficult and painful for you, I wish you a quiet place away from all the cultural glitz and holler of the day.  I wish you healing from difficult or grief-filled memories.  I wish you freedom from the expectations that clamor about you.  I wish you people in your life who nurture you and who help you discover you how strong you really are.  I wish you at least one person in your life who believes in you no matter what, who trusts your inner knowledge and ability to succeed. I wish you opportunities to mentor and care for others. I wish you the fire and power to bring to birth your own ideas and creations, to watch your dreams and projects and plans come into being as surely as any child is born into the world.

Gratitude List:
1. My mother, whom I would seek out as a friend were she not already my mother, who has been my guide as I find my own way into the land of motherhood, who believed I could do fly and sometimes sort of nudged me off the cliff’s edge a little, who has taught me the importance of firmly speaking truth to power, who has provided a motherly presence for so many people, who showed me how to pay attention and to look at the beauty of the world around me.  I love you, Mom!
2. The Motherline:
I am Beth Weaver-Kreider,
daughter of Ruth Slabaugh Weaver,
daughter of Lura Lauver Slabaugh,
daughter of Mary Emma Graybill Lauver,
daughter of Elizabeth Shelley Graybill,
daughter of Lydia Gingrich Shelley,
daughter of Elizabeth Light Gingrich,
daughter of Mary Dohner Light,
daughter of Anna Landis Dohner,
daughter of Fronica Groff Landis,
daughter of Susanna Kendig Orendorf Groff,
daughter of Elsbeth Meili Kundig,
daughter of Anna Barbara Bar Meili,
daughter of Barbara Biedermann Bar (born 1580 in Hausen, Switzerland).
3. All you who have been mentors and muses and fire-lighters and hearth-keepers for me.
4. My own two children (and perhaps also the two who did not come to be) and all they have taught me about who I am in the world, all the joy they bring.
5. Seed. Womb. Birth. Fire. Earth. Source.

May we walk in Beauty!

A New Mother’s Day Proclamation for 2013

/ Beth Weaver-Kreider / Leave a comment

Yesterday a group of us got to chatting.  I said I thought we needed–now, today–to follow Julia Ward Howe’s Mother’s Day Proclamation and set up this congress of women to work toward a better future for the world’s children.  Rochelle seconded the motion and suggested the group to begin it.  Mara responded immediately, said she’d love to see the Proclamation itself re-written for today, but she didn’t think she had time.  Within an hour, however, she had created the powerful document which follows, carrying the urgency and intensity of Ward Howe’s original, and weaving her own voice into the heart of it.

A NEW MOTHER’S DAY PROCLAMATION FOR 2013

Arise, then, women of this day! Arise, all women who have hearts, whether your home be city or country, forest or field!

Say firmly: “We will not have great questions decided by irrelevant agencies. Our children shall not be taken from us to unlearn all that we have taught them of kindness, benevolence, compassion and patienceWe women of one country will be too tender toward those of another to allow injustice and destruction to continue.”

From the throat of the devastated earth, a voice goes up with our own. It says, “Make safe, make safe!”

The work of war is not the balance of justice. Blood will not wipe out dishonor, nor violence indicate possession. As we have forsaken the plow and the anvil at the summons of war, let women now leave all that may be left of home for a great and earnest day of counsel. Let us meet first, as women, to lament and commemorate the dead. Let us take counsel with each other as to the means whereby the great human family can live in peace, each bearing into our own time the sacred impress of love.

Say firmly: “We will not stifle our voices when the voices of so many go unheard. We will speak for the speechless, cultivate comfort for the desolate, foster hope for the fearful and give them room to trust.”

From the throat of the devastated earth, a voice goes up with our own. It says, “Seek healing, seek healing!”

In the name of womanhood and of humanity, we earnestly ask that a general congress of women without limit of nationality be appointed and held at some place deemed most convenient and at the earliest period consistent with its objectives, to promote the alliance of the different nationalities, the amicable settlement of international questions, the great and general interests of peace.

Say firmly: “We will no longer turn away from violence in any form. We will challenge the dominant paradigm, offer exchange to dissonance, exemplify compassion and cultivate communication.”

From the throat of the devastated earth, a voice goes up with our own. It says, “Speak your truth! Tell your stories!”

We will not rest our heads on the pillow of oppression. We will not eat the food of tainted fields. We will not drink the elixir of fear. We will not stand by and watch each other’s children go hungry. We will not allow conflict within our homes, our countries or our world to go unnoticed, but instead will work together to find solutions that benefit all living creatures of this planet.

Say firmly: “We are the mothers of nature, the mothers of mountains. We are the mothers of the well and the mothers of the river. We are the mothers of the hearth and the mothers of the heart. We are the mothers of the wind and the mothers of the work.”

From the throat of the devastated earth, a voice goes up with our own. It says, “Celebrate the solutions! Create change!”

As women, we commit to mothering the world. We will nurture each part, offering comfort, healing and reconciliation. We will turn our attention towards the pieces that we can address and we will offer each other strength in the face of cynicism and humility in the face of arrogance. We will work together, finding our common ground and points of connection and celebrating our differences rather than allowing them to separate us. We will care for ourselves so that we may better care for others. We will make small changes day to day and build upon the larger ones with the outreach of our inspiration, honoring beauty, creativity and radical thinking.

Gratitude List:
1.  New Proclamations
2.  Seeing Lady Oriole several times in the last couple of days.  Her conversation and manner of dress are less ostentatious than those of her consort.  She appears like rays of sunlight in the dappled leaves of the sycamore, and her speech is whispery and even a little petulant compared to his piccolo.
3.  The way Jon’s music infects us all.  He’ll walk humming through a room, and suddenly I’ll notice that I or one of the boys is singing his song.  Today it was Dave Brubeck’s “Take Five.”  Joss picked it up and started humming it.
4.  Julian of Norwich:  All will be well, and all will be well.  All manner of thing shall be well.  And it may not always feel like it, but there’s that glimmer, like a yellow-green bird high in the new-green leaves of spring.  You almost can’t see it, but it’s there.  All will be well.
5.  That viral video of the couple doing karaoke at the gas pump.  I smile every time I think of them.  I want to know those bright and delightful spirits.  Such utter, spontaneous joy and playfulness.

May we walk in Beauty.