Mother's Day - A Tribute To Mothers

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"As a child I was the most uncontrollable kid. Ready to just jump from the terrace or just destroy the costly new toy or just flaunt an amazing victory smile after 'hit and run game'. Thats not all, for all that I did, I was the one who got beaten the most by my mother among the three. But, I still remember every time my mother beat me, I saw her sniffing in the corner, while I was running all around the house, like a clown just to make her smile again.

Most of the nights, she spent kneeling down looking at my angel face. May be praying to God to bless me with a good and prosperous life." Many of you may feel this is your story? But read again, this is every mother's story.

Moms are the best things that ever happened in the world. On second Sunday in May, we celebrate 'Mother's Day' to express our love, respect and gratitude to our mothers for all the things she has done for us. Read on to know the origin and interesting facts about this very special day of the year.

Origin

The history of Mother's Day celebrations can be traced back to the spring celebrations of ancient Greece in honor of Rhea, the Mother of the Gods. The ancient Romans also had another holiday, Matronalia, that was dedicated to Juno. On this day, mothers were usually given gifts. During the 1600's, the early Christians in England celebrated a day to honor Mary, the mother of Christ. After few years, due to a religious order the holiday later expanded in its scope to include all mothers, and named it as the Mothering Sunday. It was celebrated on the 4th Sunday of Lent (the 40 day period leading up to Easter).

In the United States, Mother's Day was first suggested after the American Civil War by social activist Julia Ward Howe. She suggested that it should be observed on June 2, as a day dedicated to peace. Howe was horrified by the carnage of the Civil War and the Franco-Prussian War and so, in 1870, she tried to issue a manifesto for peace at international peace conferences in London and Paris. During the Franco-Prussian war, Julia began a one-woman peace crusade and made an impassioned "appeal to womanhood" to rise against war. She composed in Boston a powerful plea that same year translated it into several languages and distributed it widely.

However, Julia Ward Howe's failed in her attempt to get formal recognition of a Mother's Day for Peace. Her idea was influenced by Ann Jarvis, a young Appalachian homemaker who, starting in 1858, had attempted to improve sanitation through what she called Mothers' Work Days. She made an attempt to organize women throughout the Civil War to work for better sanitary conditions. In 1868 she began work to reconcile Union and Confederate neighbors. She organized meetings of the mothers of soldiers of both sides of the late war.

Before Ann Jarvis could see her dream come true she died in 1907. The death did not call the saga to an end as it was carried further by her daughter, named Anna Jarvis. She started the crusade to find a memorial day for women. The first such Mother's Day was celebrated in Grafton, West Virginia, on 10 May 1908, in the church where the elder Ann Jarvis had taught Sunday School. So this year marks th 100th anniversary of the special day of mothers. Today, the building of Andrews Methodist Episcopal Church, is the International Mother's Day Shrine.

The goal was finally achieved when, President Woodrow Wilson signed a joint resolution in Congress on May 9, 1914, recommending that the federal government observes Mother's day. The next year, the president was authorized to proclaim an annual holiday. Soon it crossed the national boundary, as people in Mexico, Canada, South America, China, Japan and Africa all joined the spree to celebrate a day for mother's love. In most of East Asia, Mother's Day is a heavily marketed and commercialized concept copied straight from Mother's Day in the USA.