Happy Mother Day! Our Mother Happy or not?

Today is Mother Day. All mother in the world celebrate with their family. However, this day already become a commercial promotion or the profit making for the business community. You can see all kind of advertisement or package for the Mother Day celebration. Is this the way we celebrate the Mother Day?

It's great to celebrate Mother Day and always gratitude to the contribution of the mother to our existance in the world. We have to recognize the sacrificing of the mother. However, how about for the mother who lost their children? How about the orphan who don't have mother? Who is going to celebrate this day with them?

At the same time, our mothers who are now in Iraq, Afghanistan and other under warfare area, they are now suffering with the lost of their love children. Even many mothers become the victims of the warfare. They been killed, kidnapped and displacement. They may not know Mother Day because their life are under threaten.

In the ASA, we received the message for the Mother Day from the KASIMBAYAN from the Philippine. There are some statements that we need to reflect when we celebrate the Mother Day:

Mother's day is a one of the best occasions to recognize women's capacity
not only to bear and birth children, but to nurture humanity. Each mother has a
story to tell. As usual not all of them find the time and space to really tell each strand of their life story.

There are many mothers in our faith tradition who showed us various faces
and meaning of being mothers. We see various faces of Hagars, Rizpahs, Marys in
our own time. They are in different places. Their struggle to survive and live
with dignity in the hardest time of crisis led them to build a character that
made them strong, wise, gracious and loving mothers. Theirs is the story of
living in a cruel system of patriarchy, dominance, and state-inflicted
violence.

Rejoice! Mothers who carry forward in your hearts the passion of giving
birth to society where justice and peace reign. Being a mother-activist is an
endless challenge. The temptation to give up knocks every single moment, yet you
pursue the cause you always embraced. Hail to you mothers who are tasked with a
hundred motherly chores yet never neglect the greatest mission: to midwife and
to give birth to a society free from state violence and oppression.

Mothers of peace activists rejoice! Your sons and daughters are treading
the path of holy service to the people. Do not be disappointed with the decision
they have made, for the option to serve the cause of freedom and truth is divine
and the choice to love the neighbor is noble. Be proud for your sons and
daughters, the blessings of the struggling and hopeful people will always be
with them.

With this KASIMBAYAN's message, the ASA shared the message with the deepest heart and always remain our solidarity for the people's movement and uphold the dignity of human.