THIS SPRING, MY mother and I did something we have not done together since I was in junior high school: a creative, collaborative liturgical project. Starting when I was about 4 years old, my mother and I would make Christmas cards each year to give to our family and friends. She provided the text, usually in the form of her own biblically and seasonally inspired poetry, and I, an avid drawer, would illustrate her words. We continued this tradition for more than 10 years.
When the church I now attend invited contributions for a crowd-sourced congregational Lenten devotional booklet this year, my mother came up with an idea. She was, as she wrote, “A mom inspired by a thought—as Paul wrote letters to his beloved children and friends in faith ... so could I write a letter to my daughter.” Following the model of the Pauline epistles, my mom wrote me a letter of spiritual encouragement and advice on navigating wilderness, a key feature of both Lent and life. I decided to respond and thank her with a letter of my own. Together, the individual expressions of our relationship became a communal project.
In contemplating our project, I see a creation whose significance is more than the sum of its parts, so to speak. The joint submission of correspondence between my mother and me is not simply a nostalgic return to a lapsed family tradition. Rather, it is a reflection of a profound theological aspect of our relationship: the cultivation of selves in the space of love.
When people ask me how I became a writer or what sparked the writing bug, I usually reference certain papers I wrote in seminary, where complex theological thinking merged with my ongoing interests in my heritage and justice issues, empowering me to produce writing both personally meaningful and professionally significant. Thinking back, however, I know the seeds were planted much earlier. As a child, I was exposed not only to a love of reading but also a love of writing through my mother, who gave me journals and constantly invited me to collaborate and participate in creative writing projects, such as the Christmas cards. Her love of written expression encircled me, educated me, formed me, and, over time, drew me into becoming the writer I am today.
Put another way: My mother’s missives formed a constant invitational aspect of our relationship. It was a theological action. The offering of her own gifts invited and cultivated my own. In this way, she was not simply following in Paul’s footsteps, but in God’s, mothering me in a manner that elicited my voice and brought me forth into myself more fully.
In Alice Walker’s essay “In Search of Our Mothers’ Gardens,” she writes about the importance of perceiving the lines that connect mother and daughter and bequeath heritage, gift, and identity. I am grateful this year to have apprehended those lines a little more clearly.
Jeania Ree V. Moore is a writer, United Methodist deacon, and doctoral student in religious studies and African American studies at Yale University.
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