Mothers of faith

Today would be my maternal grandma’s 95th birthday. She died when I was nine months old. But I have heard many stories about her. I know her hands would get cold like mine do. I know she loved music and the Relief Society. She and my mom used to sing silly songs while they’d wash the dishes.

My mom and me on my mom's mom's birthday.

From all of my grandparents I have received a wonderful legacy of faith. From my grandmas, my mom, and many other mothers I have known, I have learned there are some things that all good moms have.

Good moms have faith. They pray. They read the scriptures. Their children see them do these things.

I see my mother kneeling with our family each day.
I hear the words she whispers as she bows her head to pray.
Her plea to the Father quiets all my fears,
And I am thankful love is spoken here.
(Love is Spoken Here)

Moms have charity and hope. They keep their covenants and attend church meetings and the temple.

I am not a mom. But that does not stop me from developing the traits of a good mom. For they are the traits of good women everywhere. Living a life of faith, charity, and keeping my covenants will bless my life and the lives of those around me.

Every girl and woman who makes and keeps sacred covenants can have a mother heart. There is no limit to what a woman with a mother heart can accomplish.
– Sister Julie B. Beck, “A ‘Mother Heart,’” Ensign, May 2004.

It is interesting to me that the same woman, Laurel Thatcher Ulrich, who said, “Well-behaved women seldom make history” is also described as having studied “the silent work of ordinary people” in her approach to history. Well-behaved women and mothers might not have their own names in the history books, theirs might be a silent work, but as surely as they live they have altered the course of human history.