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Raise Your Voice, This Mother's Day
A Note To Everyone Who Values Life
You may be aware that the first Mother's Day celebration in 1872 was called "Mother's Peace Day." Julia Ward Howe, author and activist, penned the "Mother's Day Proclamation," calling on women to rise up and challenge the devastating war machine. Howe was outraged over the carnage of the American Civil War and the Franco-Prussian War.
She also composed the song "Battle Hymn of the Republic," more widely known than her peace-oriented writings.
Please remind everyone you can, that Mother's Day started with Howe's efforts to organize an international Women's Peace Congress in 1872. It was not created by Hallmark or Wal-Mart, for flocks of holiday shoppers.
On Mother's Day we honor the women who nurture; who love without conditions; who forever express the value of human life.
Yet we all value life, and we can express our values.
This Mother's Day, we can stand up for peace. Peace within ourselves, our families, every-day contacts, and the entire planet. Do what you can (even a small gesture has an effect).
By focusing on love rather than fear, we can promote harmony and reconciliation. "And the light shines on in the darkness, for the darkness has not overpowered it." (1 John, 5 - from the Bible)
Raise your voice, this Mother's Day. Tell your representatives in Congress that Mother's Peace Day was a response to the senseless killings in the 1870's, and likewise, we demand an end to the killing now. Remind them of those who profit hugely from the machinery and reconstruction business of war. Yes, our rep's know about this, but they turn a blind eye, and we can remind them. Mother's Day is one way.
Julia Ward Howe held a vision of women gathering "to promote the alliance of the different nationalities, the amicable settlement of international questions, the great and general interests of peace."
Read the entire Mother's Day Proclamation:
1872, By Julia Ward Howe
Arise, then, women of this day! Arise, all women who have hearts, Whether our baptism be of water or of tears!
Say firmly: "We will not have great questions decided by irrelevant agencies, Our husbands will not come to us, reeking with carnage, for caresses and applause. Our sons shall not be taken from us to unlearn All that we have been able to teach them of charity, mercy and patience. We, the women of one country, will be too tender of those of another country To allow our sons to be trained to injure theirs."
From the bosom of the devastated Earth a voice goes up with our own. It says: "Disarm! Disarm! The sword of murder is not the balance of justice." Blood does not wipe out dishonor, nor violence indicate possession. As men have often forsaken the plough 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 them meet first, as women, to bewail and commemorate the dead. Let them solemnly take counsel with each other as to the means Whereby the great human family can live in peace, Each bearing after his own time the sacred impress, not of Caesar, But of God.
In the name of womanhood and humanity, I earnestly ask That a general congress of women without limit of nationality May be appointed and held at someplace deemed most convenient And at the earliest period consistent with its objects, To promote the alliance of the different nationalities, The amicable settlement of international questions, The great and general interests of peace.
Ann Marina is a freelance writer in Bonita Springs, Florida. Her e-mail address is: writerannak@yahoo.com
8 Comments so far
Show AllWomen gathering world wide for peace and justice. The time has come and past for empty words and deeds, that are meaningless and destructive. Give up the nice act, get down, get dirty and be prepared to fight. Men fear women of strength, use what ever powers you can gather. Never give up until death. The time is Now, we must save ourselves, and our planet.
The mothers of Northern Ireland did it. Why can we not do the same, here in America. Stop the senseless violence overseas in Iraq. The only people benefiting from this are the multi-national corporations, Haliburton and Blackwater. Mothers of America and around the world, please do your part to stop this violence as the mothers of Northern Ireland did to stop the violence in that country.
TWO Comments on this article? This is a clue as to why this war continues, unabated and horrendously wasteful of human lives and human spirit. Admittedly, most men don't have a clue about compassion and what it means to be loving and nurturing, non-violently. But, where are the women? As I read what is being said in the Spiritual, non-religious world, it is now time for the women and the feminine to step into the Peacemaking role, with the full power of the Divine Feminine. Julia Ward Howe established Mother's Day with a Peace Proclamation. Perhaps, they are not here because they are doing the work called to my Howe. I do want to recognize Code Pink and Military Families for Peace. They are making a difference. I'd just like to see more of the same. I can only hope.
Thanks, Nanoo. If not you(women), who? If not now, when?
Peace,
st john
I loved this article--never knew about the true origin of Mother's Day until now. Why has the holiday changed from a solemn one to a Hallmark/House of Pancakes giftgiving extravaganza????? Interesting how the true meaning is very relevant today, considering we've been in Iraq four years too long. The women of this world (mothers or not) need to rise up and speak out against the unecessary loss of life and carnage that this war and the Bush Administration has created.
what about the women who are not mothers, who choose not to be mothers? what about the men that are raising their childern? it is a long way from what was right in 1872 to what is right today. it is time to be human first, then men or women, then mothers or fathers....ect.... peace is not gender specific.
quote -"Yet we all value life, and we can express our values." - unquote as Ann pointed out in her beautifully written article. Enough said. Beautiful!!!!!
st john points out there were only two comments posted--I saw the proclamation yesterday and was completely undone by the third line about our sons being made to unlearn all we have taught them about charity, mercy, and patience. It is so painful to contemplate that 130 years later we face the same damn issues that those women did, and to realize that what children learn at home, as well as in school and from the media, is so much of the time uncharitable, unmerciful, and impatient. I have no children, but nephews and a niece to whom I am close, and about whom I worry little in this regard. But there are so many more children at the mercy of poverty, poor education, and a government that still so many years later views them as cannon fodder.
Perhaps the overwhelming sense that after 130 years little has changed accounts for the limited number of comments on the article. It stopped me in my tracks to read it. But I did eventually foreward it to a couple of dozen friends. I think one of our greatest strengths as women is that most of us believe in the power of the human heart to prevail, to mend.
A remarkable woman. Her Battle Hymn of the Republic bears re-reading, especially through her antiwar filter.