Mother's Day

Today is Mother’s Day in Malawi. Yes, it seems like an odd time for Americans, but this is Malawi. Mother’s Day is always on the Friday of the second week of October, regardless of the date.  Actually, Mother’s Day is quite different here. It is a National Holiday, so banks and businesses are all closed. People are encouraged to spend time with their mothers, or those who have been mothers to them (since there are so many in Malawi who have been orphaned and raised by someone other than their biological mother). It is because of this practice that I am celebrating Mother’s Day. Actually, I’m spreading the celebration out over a few days because of the boys’ schedules. Charles has church meetings today and tomorrow, so he and his family are coming on Monday morning and we will celebrate together on Monday. Since I was in Ntaja   yesterday for a teaching time at the Presbytery, Thomas and his family came down with me last night and were here for the morning. Then Jean went to see her mother and Thomas headed back for church meetings tomorrow.

But this morning, after Thomas escorted Jean to the minibus to go see her mother, he came back to have lunch and collect his luggage (and a few goodies from Mom) before heading home. We printed recent photos from his ordination and installation for him to take home. Photos are rare treats here, expensive and hard to come by. As we were scrolling through the library of pictures, we came across some older ones, from 2007, when we first became family. There was one photo that stopped me, as I remembered all that was behind the taking of it. When I showed it to Thomas, he just gave me a long, hard hug and whispered “Thanks.” The photo was of him and his biological mother, taken just a week before her death.

Many of you know the story, but as I looked at that photo, it all came back to me. It is a Malawian Mother’s Day story, the heart of what we are celebrating and worth remembering again, I think. The day the photo was taken, she was being discharged from the hospital. She had been admitted several days before.  She had pneumonia and other complications associated with HIV/Aids. Ten years before, she had made a choice to stay with her husband, knowing he was being unfaithful, and knowing that she would become infected, but also knowing that if she stayed, her 5 children would be provided for by their father. If she left, they would all be cut off from any support. The night before she was discharged, Thomas came to visit me as he returned from the hospital, with the request that I go with him to the hospital the next day to talk his mother into taking the ARV drugs the doctors were recommending she take to keep the HIV at bay. She was refusing and he wanted me to talk to her. I asked why she was refusing. He said she had explained to him that she had nothing to cause this disease. She had been faithful in her marriage. She could face her Lord and savior with a clear conscious. If she took the drugs, her life would be extended, but the little money her husband, Thomas’ father, had left the family at his death10 months before would be used up. So she was refusing. I listened and then I said I would not go to try and convince her, even if I could. For the second time in her life she was consciously choosing death over life out of love for her children. Thomas stormed out of the house and slammed the door. I fell to my knees in prayer. Early the next morning, there was a timid knock at my door. Thomas stood quietly and asked if I would go with him to get his mother, to take her home in honor of her wishes. To that I willingly agreed. At the hospital, he asked me to take their picture, which I willingly did. It is the only photo he has of his mother.

Today as we looked at that photo together, I was reminded of the great love she had for her children. She not only passed along the power of faith in Christ, she lived it in her decisions. Her actions of love made Christ’s love real to her children, especially to Thomas. He is the man he is today because of her love and example. Twice in her life she made a choice of death over life out of love for her children, a choice few women in America every have to make but one that many women in Malawi make every day. That makes Mother’s Day especially meaningful in a country of over a million orphans under the age of 18 and many more orphaned in young adulthood, as Thomas was. Mother's day is a celebrations of mothers' love. and children's response to that love. Their picture represents that.