Origin Of Mother's Day

Worldwide, on the second Sunday of May, a special day has been set aside for Mothers.  It is known today as Mother's Day. Mother's Day as we know it today, did not actually begin until the 1600's. In England, the church was decorated and honored as the "Mother Church." The Mother Church was the church where individuals had first been baptized. During the 1600's the clerics of England expanded this celebration to include women who were mothers. This celebration also occurred during Lent.  Feasts were held, and the mother was the honored guest.

The history of Mother’s Day began during the Egyptian period when cultures worshiped Goddesses and symbols. One of the first known goddesses was Isis. The story is that Isis's brother/husband had been killed. She restored his dismembered body, using it to impregnate herself. She gave birth to a son  named Horus, but hid him away from Seth, his brother. Once Horus grew up, he fought and defeated Seth, then becoming the first ruler of Egypt. Because of this, Isis was then honored as the "Mother of the Pharaoh’s." Various statues were built in her honor, and is said that one depicts her holding Seth, when he  was an infant, which resembles the statue of the "Virgin Mary" holding the baby Jesus.

Other cultures followed with those they chose to be a goddess.

• Rhea: Mother of Gods
• Gaia: Earth Goddess
• Meter Oreie: Mountain Goddess
• Magna Mater or Phrygian  Cybele originates from the festival during the Vernal Equinox

As Christians fled England, the new settlers known as Pilgrims, discontinued many of the holidays that they once celebrated, including "Mother's Day." Not until 1870, was a proclamation made, which involved Julia Ward Howe, writer of the "Battle Hymn Of The Republic" worked with other women, organizing them to protest the senseless killings of the Civil War. The women saw this as one mothers son killing the son of another mother. At that time, Mother's Day  was an event for women to organize together to celebrate Peace and Motherhood.

Multiple attempts were made to make Mothers Day an official holiday. A woman by the name of Anne Jarvis was an important figure who fought to have Mother's Day recognized as an official holiday to honor motherhood. She also contributed to the beginning of carnations being used to honor mothers, who were deceased, as well as those who were alive.

West Virginia was the first state to establish Mother's Day as a holiday. However, not until Woodrow Wilson, in 1914, signed into law recognizing "Mother's Day, to be observed nationally on the second Sunday of May. 

Today, as cultures have changed, the second Sunday of May, Mother's Day, is a day when Mothers are doted on, taken out to dinner, given gifts and flowers, including the historical Carnation, which was a tradition started long ago by Anne Jarvis.