Garden of the Mother

GARDEN OF THE MOTHER

Shortly before his sudden death, Pope John Paul I, speaking
about God at a Sunday Angelus blessing in St. Peter’s Square,
said: “He is Father. Even more, God is Mother.”

We worship God our Mother in solitude, seeking the secret
places to be with her. She lives in the secret garden, in
the dark place of deepest interiority. Everything in
the garden magnifies her presence because everything there
pours from her source. The garden flows with her white milk
and golden honey and all her children are fed. Everything
participates in her being. Everything is holy.

Haunted by her mystery, we are roused to enter the garden
where she is always waiting for us to arrive. Searching for
our Mother, we run through trees, lifting stones, kneeling
at every pool and animals’ hollow, looking into every cleft
and beneath birds’ wings. We are overwhelmed when we find
her. Welcomed, we sink into her tender matrix, enclosed in
the grotto of God’s eternity.

Page 62 Sign of the Tree
Meinrad Craighead
1970s; Stanbrook Abbey; Ink on Scratchboard; 10×10

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