Mothers as Nurturers

This week, I learned about the importance of mothers in the home and how they nurture their children. Janet J. Erickson says in Successful Marriages and Families that "mothers are primarily responsible for the nurture of their children."

The relationship formed through a mother's attentive love provides the foundation for all of the other major tasks of parenthood. Many mothers feel that society does not value the kind of self-sacrificing work motherhood requires. Because of this, it causes a lot of women to invest their energy into a work place where they feel like their work is most valued, which is very sad. The reading states, "for most of our history, the word motherhood meant honor, endearment, and sacrifice... Yet this spirit of self-sacrifice has become a contentious issue in recent years, making contentious the very idea of motherhood." For those of you that do not know, contentious basically means controversial or argued about.

Motherhood in the home used to be less controversial. It was very traditional where the husband would work away from the home to support the family, while the women would stay home, keep up with the household chores and cooking, and take care of the children. As society has shifted, we see more than ever mothers working outside of the home and becoming more reliant on receiving pleasure from their jobs rather than their personal life.

In The Family: A Proclamation to the World, it states that "by divine design, fathers are to preside over their families in love and righteousness and are responsible to provide the necessities of life and protection for their families. Mothers are primarily responsible for the nurture of their children. In these sacred responsibilities, fathers and mothers are obligated to help one another as equal partners." Motherhood is important because it is filled with responsibilities different than that of a father, and they fit together like a puzzle piece.

Successful Marriages and Families talks about how mothers have a sacred role because they are partners with God, as well as with their husbands, because they first give birth to the Lord's children, and then they rear those children so they will serve the Lord and keep His commandments.