The image of Our Lady on the Talmud of St. Juan Diego

Is your Mother’s Day filled with sadness, grief or even anger because your mother is absent? Perhaps your mother has died. Perhaps you never knew your biological mother. Perhaps she was abusive. Both of our mothers are deceased. So for our family, Mother’s Day has an element of sadness and sorrow.

Did you know that Jesus has given you a perfect mother?

Standing by the cross of Jesus were his mother, and his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Mag′dalene. When Jesus saw his mother, and the disciple whom he loved standing near, he said to his mother, “Woman, behold, your son!” Then he said to the disciple, “Behold, your mother!” And from that hour the disciple took her to his own home. John 19:25-27

Just before Jesus died on the cross, He gave his mother to His beloved disciple John. Not only did Jesus give His mother to John, but He gave His mother to all of us. In spite of wounds we may have received from absent, deceased, or abusive mothers, we can turn to the Blessed Virgin Mary for solace and help.

Jesus wants His mother to be intimately involved in our lives as a model of holiness, a consoler, and powerful intercessor. The Blessed Mother has many different names that describe important roles she plays in our lives:

• Mother of Divine Grace
• Our Lady of Good Counsel
• Seat of Wisdom
• Comforter of the Afflicted
• Untier of Knots
• Mother of Perpetual Help

Whether we had an outstanding mom or something less than ideal, we can look to the Blessed Mother as an exemplar of motherly love.

Listen to the words of Our Lady to St. Juan Diego on the Tepeyac hill in 16th century Mexico. Meditate on her words, letting them permeate your heart…

Let not your heart be disturbed.

Do not fear sickness, not any other anguish.

Am I not here, who am your Mother?

Are you not under my protection?

Am I not your health?

Are you not happily within my fold?

What else do you wish?

Do not grieve nor be disturbed by anything.

Prayer to Our Lady

Remember, O most gracious Virgin of Guadalupe, that in your apparitions on Mount Tepeyac you promised to show pity and compassion to all who, loving and trusting you, seek your help and protection.

Accordingly, listen now to our supplications and grant us consolation and relief. We are full of hope that, relying on your help, nothing can trouble or affect us. As you have remained with us through your admirable image, so now obtain for us the graces we need. Amen.

Prayer of Pope John Paul the Great to Our Lady of Guadalupe

O Immaculate Virgin, Mother of the true God and Mother of the Church, who from this place reveal your clemency and your pity to all those who ask for your protection, hear the prayer that we address to you with filial trust, and present it to your Son Jesus, our sole Redeemer.

Mother of Mercy, Teacher of hidden and silent sacrifice, to you, who come to meet us sinners, we dedicate on this day all our being and all our love. We also dedicate to you our life, our work, our joys, our infirmities and our sorrows. Grant peace, justice and prosperity to our peoples; for we entrust to your care all that we have and all that we are, our Lady and Mother. We wish to be entirely yours and to walk with you along the way of complete faithfulness to Jesus Christ in His Church; hold us always with your loving hand.

Grant to our homes the grace of loving and respecting life in its beginnings, with the same love with which you conceived in your womb the life of the Son of God. Blessed Virgin Mary, protect our families, so that they may always be united, and bless the upbringing of our children.

Our hope, look upon us with compassion, teach us to go continually to Jesus and, if we fall, help us to rise again, to return to Him, by means of the confession of our faults and sins in the Sacrament of Penance, which gives peace to the soul.

We beg you to grant us a great love for all the holy Sacraments, which are, as it were, the signs that your Son left us on earth.

Thus, Most Holy Mother, with the peace of God in our conscience, with our hearts free from evil and hatred, we will be able to bring to all true joy and true peace, which come to us from your Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, who with God the Father and the Holy Spirit, lives and reigns for ever and ever. Amen.

His Holiness John Paul II

Basilica, Mexico City, January 1979

Holy Mother’s Day. May your day be blessed and filled with great joy.