A small posey

Usually, today my daughters and I would go to church. When they were little they would be asked if they would like to hand round small bunches of daffodils to all the ladies in the church. Every lady, regardless of whether they were a mother or not would get three or four bright nodding flowers.

They loved being these little flower girls, mainly because it was a moment of excitement in a calm service but also for the connection it gave them to people they saw every week but didn’t really know much about.

If I asked my girls why we gave flowers to ladies in church they would probably say that it was Mother’s Day and you do nice things on Mother’s Day. To an extent that’s true. But my interpretation goes deeper than that.

God is often referred to in masculine terms. Mothering Sunday is one of the few times when God’s relationship with the worldwide church is referred to. The idea is that maternal characteristics are not necessarily bound up in gender. It’s an out moded convenience that we have started to move away from.

Being able to nurture, care, seek and secure the lost, to feed and love. These are not just feminine qualities. I know plenty of male friends who are excellent ‘mothers’ in the same way that I know women who do the mother and father role by themselves.

So what is the church saying? Why are these little bunches of flowers given to women? It comes down to hope and promise. That God has powerful and gentle sides to their character. If we were truly made in the image of God, then when we stand together, attempting the be the best version of ourselves, then we will reflect small facets of God’s image.

The flowers may originally have been a pagan symbol of life, spring and all things waking up after winter. They may have been given to women because it shows the potential for new life to come into this world. But I would argue now that Mothering Sunday is less about the potential for new life and more about the attitude of love and nurture in society, regardless of who has that love or who does the nurturing. So perhaps we should give our small posies to everyone on Mothering Sunday.