2.5 Burden or Blessing? How Motherhood Transforms Us
Emily and Katie discuss the transformational nature of motherhood. It is a new identity given to each woman. It is not easy, but neither is it a burden. The discussion comes to focus on the increasingly negative view of motherhood in America as a tremendous burden and miserable "career"; as a "gauntlet", a torture, and a daunting task. Emily remembers her own similar feelings when early on in motherhood and Katie describes the transformation she experienced when she became a mother and the true nature of motherhood that modernity has all but squashed in women. Enjoy!
“Conceived in sin. Carried under her hard, evil heart. Pulled out of her sin-tainted body, so pure, so healthy, so inexpressibly lovely and fresh and innocent. This undeserved beneficence broke her heart in two; crushed with remorse, she lay there with tears welling up out of her soul like blood from a mortal wound.” - Kristin Lavransdatter by Sigrid Undset
“Children make us better people and often better Christians. This is all part of that tether I keep talking about. Our children are tethers, too. They hold us to the past, to our heritage, to our Christianity. As strange as it sounds to our modern ears, we are saved through childbearing (1 Timothy 2:11). Motherhood is a high calling. Civilization depends upon motherhood. I do not believe you should lose yourself so thoroughly in your motherhood that that is all you are. That is not healthy for you or your family. But I do think women need to know that motherhood is a high-value commodity in the market of civilization." - Mere Motherhood by Cindy Rollins
“Real isn’t how you are made. It’s a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real.” - The Velveteen Rabbit by Margery Williams
“Of the many wonderful qualities of Kristin Lavransdatter, one is that it can be read as a thousand-some page answer to the question, what is motherhood for? The answer is salvation.”
https://www.firstthings.com/web-exclusives/2011/01/under-her-heart
The Mother’s Gauntlet - The American Mind https://americanmind.org/salvo/the-mothers-gauntlet/
Find Emily at: https://agoodwilderness.substack.com/