God Is Our Mother
Pope John Paul I reflected on today’s very passage from Isaiah and said simply: “God is our father; even more, God is our mother.”
Dear friends,
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Each day during Lent, I’ll be reflecting on the day’s readings — sitting with the scriptures, wrestling with what they demand of us, and asking the questions we’d rather avoid. These reflections are personal. They’re searching. They’re meant to be prayed with, not just read.
If you’re walking the Lenten road this year, I’d be honored to walk it with you.
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“Can a mother forget her infant, be without tenderness for the child of her womb? Even should she forget, I will never forget you.” — Isaiah 49:15
I prayed the readings this morning and felt caught off guard. The language is so tender it startles you.
Isaiah writes God’s response to a people who feel forgotten: “Can a mother forget her infant, be without tenderness for the child of her womb? Even should she forget, I will never forget you.”
There are hundreds of passages in scripture about God’s justice, God’s wrath, God’s sovereignty. Theologians have filled entire libraries with arguments about God as lawgiver and judge. But here, in the middle of Lent — in a season built around repentance and self-denial — the prophet reaches for a completely different image. A mother nursing her child.
This shouldn’t surprise us, though it always does. Scripture returns to maternal imagery for God more often than we care to admit.
