Speaker 1: Hey, everyone, God bless you. Thanks so much for tuning in.
Speaker 2: In my opinion, one of the most important and counter
Speaker 2: cultural aspects of formation that we do in the Church
Speaker 2: is by lifting motherhood to its proper position. And the
Speaker 2: West has decided that motherhood can be mocked, motherhood can
Speaker 2: be destroyed, it can be thrown on the ground and
Speaker 2: stamped on and spit on, which is exactly what's happening
Speaker 2: and has been happening for some time in our culture.
Speaker 1: If you're going to be an orthodox Christian, if you're going.
Speaker 2: To actually become a person who is a disciple of Christ,
Speaker 2: you're going to have to have a radical change in
Speaker 2: your thoughts about motherhood. You're going to have to abandon
Speaker 2: the cultural hostility that we see everywhere, not just in
Speaker 2: the birth rates, of course, which are the most catastrophic
Speaker 2: witness to the abandonment cultural devaluation of motherhood and of
Speaker 2: humanity in general, since we don't care about having children
Speaker 2: anymore who are the image of God. Utter foolishness, Utter foolishness.
Speaker 2: It's not just the birth rate, but also the percentage
Speaker 2: of those who are not getting married and are never
Speaker 2: becoming mothers is just absolutely sky rocketing. And if you're
Speaker 2: going to be a Christian, and you're going to be
Speaker 2: you're going to escape from this dark and falling world
Speaker 2: into the light of God. You have to change your
Speaker 2: mind about the glories of motherhood.
Speaker 1: And you can do that by living in the Church.
Speaker 2: Because the Church is herself a mother, the greatest of
Speaker 2: all mothers, and her nurturing love is well it's the
Speaker 2: foundation of our success in the Christian life. Saint Paul
Speaker 2: calls the Church our mother and says that the Church
Speaker 2: is the Jerusalem above who is our mother. We also
Speaker 2: in the Church teach people to understand and know and
Speaker 2: love the most pure Virgin Mary, the Theotokos. Her presence
Speaker 2: is so civilizing, her radical mother, not just of her son,
Speaker 2: our Lord Jesus Christ, but of the whole Church. She
Speaker 2: relates to us as a mother and teaches us how
Speaker 2: to accept love and be loved and value motherhood. I
Speaker 2: want to read to you now a brief paragraph or
Speaker 2: so about a number of saintly mothers that I have
Speaker 2: found encouraging and who have what shall I say, rocked
Speaker 2: my world and helped me to be more human. This
Speaker 2: is what love is. This is how the Church produces beauty.
Speaker 2: The opposite, of course, is the harlot of Babylon, who's
Speaker 2: also a mother, an awful mother, a mother of harlots
Speaker 2: and all the abominations of the earth. We reject that
Speaker 2: kind of fake, bogus satanic motherhood and all of its
Speaker 2: substrata that we see in our culture today, and we
Speaker 2: embrace true motherhood, motherhood of the Church, the motherhood of
Speaker 2: the Virgin Mary, and of all the saintly women who
Speaker 2: have put the love of God and the love of
Speaker 2: their families above everything else. Let me tell you about
Speaker 2: a few glorious mothers. Saint Macrina the Mother, the grandmother
Speaker 2: rather of Saint Basil the Great. She was outstanding for
Speaker 2: her intellect and piety. She was a disciple of Saint
Speaker 2: Gregory the wonder Worker, teaching her family how to have
Speaker 2: a spiritual father. In the reign of Diocletian, she abandoned
Speaker 2: her home and hid in the forest and desert places
Speaker 2: with her husband Basil. Although their home was confiscated, they
Speaker 2: felt no pangs of regret. Can you imagine she modeled
Speaker 2: being attached to the things above and not being a materialist.
Speaker 2: Stripped of everything except their love for God, they settled
Speaker 2: in the ancient forest and spent seven years there, and
Speaker 2: by God's providence, goats would come from the mountains and
Speaker 2: provide them with food. Saint Emilia the mother of Saint
Speaker 2: Basil the Great, so that was Macreeena of the Grandmother.
Speaker 2: Of course, Basil also has a sister of Saint Macgreena
Speaker 2: and named after the grandmother. Saint Emilia, the mother of
Speaker 2: Saint Basil the Great, bore ten children and endowed each
Speaker 2: of them with a Christian spirit, so that at least
Speaker 2: six of them became Saints Basil the Great, Gregory of Nissa,
Speaker 2: Peter of sebast Novcratius, Macrina Theo Savilla. She founded a
Speaker 2: monastery in her old age, where she lived with her
Speaker 2: daughter Macrina, and where she entered into the Rest and
Speaker 2: the Lord on the eighth of May in three seventy five.
Speaker 2: Saint Martha followed the practice of rising at midnight to pray,
Speaker 2: visited the poor and the sick constantly. This is one
Speaker 2: universal of Godly mothers is that they have hearts of compassion,
Speaker 2: and they teach us, especially their sons. They teach their
Speaker 2: sons how to have sympathy, how to combine a quest
Speaker 2: for strength, but with tenderness, like our savior has. She
Speaker 2: ended up living and being buried at the base of
Speaker 2: her son's pillar. She spent her last decades listening to
Speaker 2: his daily preaching, because he would preach at three o'clock
Speaker 2: in the afternoon, at the ninth hour, I believe, and
Speaker 2: she would listen to him, and she lived and ended
Speaker 2: up being buried at his pillar.
Speaker 1: Incredible women, Incredible mothers.
Speaker 2: Glorious mothers provide powerful support for their children in the
Speaker 2: midst of a dark world of temptations. Think of the
Speaker 2: righteous Solomonia and her seven Maccabee's sons. Two courses, it
Speaker 2: says in the scriptures, were open to this mother, that
Speaker 2: of religion and that of preserving her seven sons for
Speaker 2: a time as the tyrant had promised. She loved religion more,
Speaker 2: religion that preserves them for eternal life. According to God's promise.
Speaker 2: The mother of the seven boys more than any other
Speaker 2: mother loved her children. In seven pregnancies. She had implanted
Speaker 2: in herself tender love towards them, and because of the
Speaker 2: many pains she suffered with each of them, she had
Speaker 2: sympathy for them. That's what a pious mother does. She
Speaker 2: calls her son to act for God's sake. Glorious mothers
Speaker 2: lift their sons up, They pick them up, they orient them.
Speaker 2: This is how mothers can help sons who are weak
Speaker 2: or are falling by their courage. And of course, I
Speaker 2: think some of you may know the story of the
Speaker 2: incredible mother and wife of Saint James, the person this
Speaker 2: is November twenty seventh, who he who was so high
Speaker 2: up in the Persian kingdom, the best friend of the Emperor,
Speaker 2: of the Pagan Emperor, who under great and extreme pressure,
Speaker 2: entered into the house of Pagan worship and knelt, and
Speaker 2: his mother and his wife disowned him, gave him a
Speaker 2: stentorian rebuke for participating in Persian worship, and by this
Speaker 2: brought him to his repentance. And he offered every part
Speaker 2: of his body as he was chopped to pieces, as
Speaker 2: an offering of repentance to Christ for having compromised himself.
Speaker 1: Where would we be without our mothers.
Speaker 2: We lift our voices in thanksgiving to God for our
Speaker 2: pious mothers, lived our voices in praise to them with
Speaker 2: great gratitude, acknowledging how much we cherish them, how much
Speaker 2: we love them. And I say to all of you
Speaker 2: who are looking for a wife, look for a wife
Speaker 2: who will be a great mother. And all you young
Speaker 2: ladies who are anticipating being wed, embrace the incredible calling
Speaker 2: of motherhood. Follow the Virgin in this most sublime, holy,
Speaker 2: meaningful calling to actually bear children the image of God
Speaker 2: and to raise them as beautiful, beautiful servants of the
Speaker 2: Holy Trinity. That may the Lord save us all by
Speaker 2: our mother's prayers.
Speaker 1: Amen.
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