{"id":6956,"date":"2016-12-29T08:15:10","date_gmt":"2016-12-29T14:15:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/customwordpresssites.com\/mjb\/?p=6956"},"modified":"2026-02-26T13:44:21","modified_gmt":"2026-02-26T19:44:21","slug":"in-gods-image-finding-jesus-in-the-mundane-mess-of-motherhood","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/customwordpresssites.com\/mjb\/2016\/12\/29\/in-gods-image-finding-jesus-in-the-mundane-mess-of-motherhood\/","title":{"rendered":"In God\u2019s Image: Finding Jesus in the Mundane Mess of Motherhood"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cYour loving doesn\u2019t know its majesty, until it knows its helplessness.\u201d \u00a0\u00a0\u2013 Rumi<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

\u201cPretty bad day here – I think if parenting was something one was allowed to quit I would have by now \u2026\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

This was the content of an e-mail I tapped out on the phone to my husband while he was at work and I was home with our two kiddos, age one and three, approximately. \u00a0Trust me, if you\u2019re mind is jumping to judgment at the wimpyness of my parenthood or the flakiness of my fidelity to family; I jumped there first and with a larger arsenal of accusations against my ineptitude and impatience. \u00a0But regardless of how much I<\/span> thought <\/span><\/i>I should be more patient and gentle and joyful in motherhood, what I <\/span>felt<\/span><\/i> was, to put it mildly, overwhelmed. \u00a0I was overwhelmed in an <\/span>implosion is imminent<\/b> way that the ubiquitously used \u201coverwhelmed\u201d just doesn\u2019t adequately convey.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Nee-Walker<\/a>
Courtesy of Amy Nee-Walker<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cRemember that scene from Jesus Christ Superstar, with the lepers?\u201d I ask my husband who has called, concerned, after reading my e-mail. \u00a0He does not remember. \u00a0Do you? \u00a0Despite its campiness, and the Christ figure\u2019s wild falsetto, I was so moved and marked by this scene when I first saw the 1973 film version of this rock opera years ago. \u00a0Jesus is walking into the desert, singing to himself of his mission and journey, seeking a quiet space to reflect and pray. \u00a0As he walks he is confronted by \u201clepers\u201d, covered in dark rags, first one, then two, a handful, then hordes, singing out their needs to him, urgently, repeatedly. \u00a0At first Jesus reaches out to each one, compassion and determination evident on his face. \u00a0By the end of the scene though, his expression has shifted to one of desperation, even terror as he cries out, \u201cthere\u2019s too little of me!\u201d \u00a0The scene ends with his image all but swallowed up by the beggars as he screams, \u201cleave me alone!\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

That is the scene that came to mind as I thought about how parenting felt to me this past week. \u00a0As I recounted it to my husband, of course digging up the<\/span>\u00a0YouTube<\/a> clip<\/span> to share, I recalled to myself why I had found this scene so striking in the first place and carried it with me all these years. The fullness of Jesus\u2019 humanity, the rawness of emotion, of vulnerability, the capacity for fear and despair in the midst of determination and faithfulness had never been so evident to me as it was in this midrashic moment. \u00a0It was an \u2018Oh my God\u201d moment, not in a slanderous slang way but in a Thomas touching wounded hands and feet, \u201cMy Lord and my God\u201d way. \u00a0The idea of God coming to earth as a man capable of fear and exhaustion can come as a bit of a letdown for those of us who might sometimes hope for a superhero savior who will scoop us up from the messiness of life on earth and spirit us away to a pristine heavenly home. But imagine the radical, outrageous love that compels the God of All Things, Being Itself, Creator of the Universe not to scoop us out of the mess but to join us creatures, and humans in particular, in it for the sake of restoring relationship.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Courtesy<\/a>
Courtesy of Amy Nee-Walker<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The same night as the e-mail, after the kids were in bed (hopefully for at least an hour or two before tumbling into ours), I was immersed in the warmth and rhythm of washing dishes, enjoying my empathic bond with an image of Jesus from the 70s and contemplating Incarnation. \u00a0I was also listening to a rebroadcast of an <\/span>interview with Fr. James Martin on Krista Tippet\u2019s OnBeing<\/span><\/a>. It was a seasonally appropriate rebroadcasting and they began to talk about Christmas, commercialism and the often overlooked scandal of the true nativity story. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a terrifying story in terms of what they had to undergo\u201d Fr. Martin was saying, \u201cIt is a shocking story. It\u2019s not just a baby. It is God being born in human form. And it\u2019s just as shocking as the resurrection. And I think we\u2019ve tamed it\u2026 We can just kind of look on it, and say, \u201cWell, that\u2019s cute.\u201d \u00a0But if you say to people, \u201cDo you believe that that is God incarnate in that stable? What does that mean for you, that God comes to us as the most helpless being that you could imagine, sort of crying and wetting his pants and needing to be nursed? What does that say to us about who God is for us, and how God is for us, and how much God loved us to do that?\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWhat did he just say?\u201d I thought. I had to rewind and listen again. \u00a0I consider myself someone quite familiar with the nativity story, even the complexity and danger and dirtiness of it. \u00a0There was nothing especially new about how Fr. Martin had described it, except that one word; \u201c<\/span>nursed.<\/span><\/i>\u201d \u00a0One of the most beleaguering things for me has been that my daughter, who will be one on Christmas Eve, still nurses, on average, every two hours through the night. Calling it nursing, I feel, is another word that lacking. \u00a0My daughter tugs mercilessly at my breast. \u00a0I could never have imagined the elasticity of human skin before mothering this child. \u00a0Her version of nursing is not a snuggling, nuzzling seeking of nourishment and bonding but a primal, mammalian, devouring of prey.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Courtesy<\/a>
Courtesy of Amy Nee-Walker<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cAnd yet,\u201d I am shaking my head in wonder at the thought, \u201cJesus nursed.\u201d \u00a0Jesus cried out in the night with pangs of hunger, of fear perhaps, of a simple desire for warm, familiar flesh. \u00a0How did Mary feel? \u00a0Was she exhausted and exasperated? \u00a0Did she simply move on auto-pilot through the familiar motions? Did she have ever-present the prophecy of an impending sword to her heart and treasure every moment in which she had the privilege to cradle her child, to meet his needs and sooth his troubles? \u00a0Here I had been imagining the overwrought Jesus, beat down by the demands of others and suddenly I am confronted by Jesus the infant whose whole being is a bundle of demands. \u00a0It occurs to me that Jesus, in his earthly lifetime, lived both sides of the coin of giving and receiving. \u00a0This is something we all share with him and each other.<\/span><\/p>\n

The next day, despite the gift of perceiving Christ\u2019s presence both in my weariness and in my children\u2019s insatiableness, I continue to struggle. \u00a0My tone of voice slips too often from calm to stern to angry. \u00a0I say more \u201cno\u2019s\u201d than necessary. \u00a0\u00a0I am not the person or parent I want to be. \u00a0Still, at the end of the day, my son unwittingly reveals to me yet another way in which Christ is manifest in his small, precocious, presence. \u00a0Washing the dishes again, this time while the kids are awake, playing with their dad, I am interrupted by my son popping in the kitchen, \u201cCome dance with me,\u201d he says. \u00a0\u201cI can\u2019t, my sweet boy.\u201d \u00a0A few minutes later, he\u2019s back, \u201cCome play with me, Mama.\u201d A third time, \u201cCome, read with me.\u201d \u00a0\u00a0Despite my eruptions, despite my busyness and rejections, he keeps returning to me, desiring to be with me, delighting in my presence. \u00a0In his beckoning, I hear a phrase, so similar, from Jesus, \u201cCome, follow me.\u201d \u00a0However helpless you may feel, however you have failed, come, let us walk together.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Courtesy<\/a>
Courtesy of Amy Nee-Walker<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

ABOUT THE RABBLE ROUSER<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"Nee-Walker<\/a>Amy Nee-Walker<\/strong> grew up in the middle of a large and lovely family in Central Florida.\u00a0Living into questions about truth and love has led\u00a0her to the Catholic Worker, the Catholic Church, her incredible\u00a0husband, two audacious, adorable children, and (for the time being) a\u00a0home in the hills of Appalachia.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cYour loving doesn\u2019t know its majesty, until it knows its helplessness.\u201d \u00a0\u00a0\u2013 Rumi \u201cPretty bad day here – I think if parenting was something one was allowed to quit I would have by now \u2026\u201d This was the content of an e-mail I tapped out on the phone to my husband while he was at...","protected":false},"author":4256190,"featured_media":6958,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_kad_blocks_custom_css":"","_kad_blocks_head_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_body_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_footer_custom_js":"","episode_type":"","audio_file":"","podmotor_file_id":"","podmotor_episode_id":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","filesize_raw":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","_kad_post_transparent":"","_kad_post_title":"","_kad_post_layout":"","_kad_post_sidebar_id":"","_kad_post_content_style":"","_kad_post_vertical_padding":"","_kad_post_feature":"","_kad_post_feature_position":"","_kad_post_header":false,"_kad_post_footer":false,"_kad_post_classname":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[698755598,2178641],"tags":[36894,1343,214,14196316,401,406,13111133,7816,8329,233969,3785,4089,291283,228665,5309,245,34941365,1904],"series":[698756626],"class_list":["post-6956","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-christian-family-life","category-prayer-and-spirituality","tag-breastfeeding","tag-children","tag-christianity","tag-christmas","tag-faith","tag-family","tag-fr-james-martin","tag-god","tag-jesus","tag-jesus-christ-superstar","tag-love","tag-motherhood","tag-on-being","tag-overwhelmed","tag-parenting","tag-reflections","tag-relationship-2","tag-true-stories","series-messy-jesus-business"],"acf":[],"episode_featured_image":"https:\/\/customwordpresssites.com\/mjb\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/12\/unnamed-3.jpg","episode_player_image":"https:\/\/customwordpresssites.com\/mjb\/wp-content\/plugins\/seriously-simple-podcasting\/assets\/images\/no-album-art.png","download_link":"","player_link":"","audio_player":false,"episode_data":{"playerMode":"dark","subscribeUrls":{"apple_podcasts":{"key":"apple_podcasts","url":"","label":"Apple Podcasts","class":"apple_podcasts","icon":"apple-podcasts.png"},"stitcher":{"key":"stitcher","url":"","label":"Stitcher","class":"stitcher","icon":"stitcher.png"},"google_podcasts":{"key":"google_podcasts","url":"","label":"Google Podcasts","class":"google_podcasts","icon":"google-podcasts.png"},"spotify":{"key":"spotify","url":"","label":"Spotify","class":"spotify","icon":"spotify.png"}},"rssFeedUrl":"https:\/\/customwordpresssites.com\/mjb\/feed\/podcast\/messy-jesus-business","embedCode":"

In God\u2019s Image: Finding Jesus in the Mundane Mess of Motherhood<\/a><\/blockquote>