Berkeley Forum

Today, May 13, 2007, America will observe “Mother’s Day” with a $16-billion commercial blitz of cards, flowers and restaurant meals. .While many people value and celebrate the contributions of mothers to their family not too many people know that " Mother's day actually began as a women's peace proclamation which has clearly being expressed in the Julia Ward Howe's 1870 English Language Poem.

Today, a group of mothers led by prominent and well known war opponent Cindy Sheehan, who lost her son in Iraq, reclaiming “ Mother’s Day” as a day to protest war and started a 24 hours vigil outside the white house to protest the war in Iraq.

She said in a press conference " I don't want any more mums to grieve for a child lost in this unjust, unnecessary war in Iraq,"

So, as America celebrates Mother’s Day, let us remember that prior to 1914 when the first mother’s day was enacted, Mother’s day was a day in which women would rise up for peace in the world. Let us remember that motherhood is not only a biological fact, it is the quality of nurturing. Many women who never experience being a mother, mother the world by nurturing and healing the communities, locally and globally. They all believe that another world is possible. A world with peace, equality and respect to human rights. .

Mother's Day Proclamation

Arise then ... women of this day!
Arise, all women who have hearts!
Whether your baptism be of water or of tears!
Say firmly:
"We will not have questions answered by irrelevant agencies,
Our husbands will not come to us, reeking with carnage,
For caresses and applause.
Our sons shall not be taken from us to unlearn
All that we have been able to teach them of charity, mercy,
and patience.
We, the women of one country,
Will be too tender of those of another country
To allow our sons to be trained to injure theirs."

From the voice of the devastated Earth a voice goes up with
Our own. It says: "Disarm! Disarm!
The sword of murder is not the balance of justice."
Blood does not wipe our dishonor,
Nor violence indicate possession.
As men have often forsaken the plough and the anvil
At the summons of war,
Let women now leave all that may be left of home
For a great and earnest day of counsel.
Let them meet first, as women, to bewail and commemorate the dead,
Let them solemnly take counsel with each other as to the means
Whereby the great human family can live in peace.

-Elaheh Amani

# posted by Berkeley Forum : 6:23 PM