Zelia

A priest I know once said to me sadly, ‘These Polish children are so poor, so often unwanted’. As if to confirm this diagnosis, the next day I heard from my friend whom I hadn’t seen for a long time the following: ‘We have two children already, a boy and a girl, and I hope that’s gonna be it’.

And then I remembered the blessed Zelia Martin, the mother of St. Therese of the Child Jesus. She wrote in one of her letters to her sister-in-law that she loved her children madly and she’d been born to have them. And yet her motherhood brought her so much suffering. When she wrote those words, just before the birth of her youngest, ninth daughter – Therese, she had gone through many diseases and through the loss of her “four angels”, the children who died early. She felt a lot of pain because of the problems with one of her daughters, “the poor Leonia”. She knew better than anyone else that motherhood did not only mean joy. Still, she loved her children madly and wanted to have more. And what she desired most was that her children “be saint”, she wanted to bear them “for heaven”.

Why not take a look at our parenthood  with the eyes of faith in the Year of Faith?

Basia