Dear Friends,
A while back my friend (and roommate), Calvin, reflected on the Nepali custom of speaking to someone as if they are a member of your family. The terms dai (older brother) and bai (younger brother) are used when speaking to men. Didi (older sister) and bahini (younger sister) are spoken to women. I’ve even gotten into the habit of calling little girls nani and little boys babu, the affectionate terms for son and daughter. The elderly men, like my friend Gautam’s father, we call bua (father). And the elderly women, amma, or mother. Calvin discovered that when using this language, it is a lot harder to ignore those in need. He would never, for instance, tell his mother he had no money he could give her.
As Calvin points to, speaking to each other with these terms reveals the truth: that we are family. As beloved children of God, we are deeply connected to each other. Though I have left my sister and brother, my mother and my father and moved to Nepal, I am learning that God is providing new sisters, brothers, fathers, and especially mothers.
Amma. Amma is the woman I talk with at the local Tibetan restaurant, as I eat Tibetan roti (pita bread) stuffed with buffalo meat. Amma is Jammuna, a WMF staff member at Karuna Ghar (Home of Compassion) who likes to joke that I am her chora (another term for son), though she is barely older than me. And amma is the woman at Prem Ghar (Home of Love), actually the seven women, who have been widowed, abandoned, and in their old age told they are not worth the time or expense of a quickening world.
Near the cross of Jesus stood his mother, his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. “When Jesus saw his mother there, and the disciple whom he loved standing nearby, he said to her, “Woman, here is your son,””and to the disciple, “Here is your mother.” From that time on, this disciple took her into his home.
(John 19:25-27, TNIV)
Because of what we see as excesses of respect and honor to the mother of God, we Protestants have become afraid of Mary. I find it striking though, that Jesus doesn’t just say, “take care of my mother.” Instead he points to that truth that we are all connected, we are all family. Here is your mother. And to her he says, here is your son. If we can leave aside, for a moment, the debate about whether or not this means she is the mother of all of humanity, we might just catch the beauty in what Jesus says while he hangs on the cross. Here is your son. Here is your mother. What can John do to his mother, but take her into his home?
I love going to Prem Ghar because it brings me into life with elderly women, in whom I can see the sorrows and joys of life intermingled. The sorrows of living the life of one who is not only deeply impoverished, but is so as a woman in a country that constantly gives second class status to women, speaking degradation and dehumanization to them throughout their entire lives. And the joys of having lived a full life and at the end of their days find themselves in a community of love. I love going there because it is in those joys and sorrows that life is found. And I want to share that life with them. They are my mothers.
The upper floor of Prem Ghar is where two of my mothers hang out. Shakal Shoba Amma was carried in a basket for four days on her way to Prem Ghar. My heart jumps every time she calls me nani, her child (I’ve recently learned nani is not used exclusively for daughter. I assure you, my mother doesn’t think I’m a girl). Ganni Amma was living at Swayambu, also known as the Monkey Temple, where she would beg for rupees before being taken to Prem Ghar. I can’t make out a lot of what she says, but I do know when I hear babu. And I love it. I love being addressed with such affection from these precious women.
When I go to Prem Ghar and speak to my ammas, listen to them call me their son, their child, I cannot deny the true connection of our humanity, the truth that all of us are part of the family of God. Here is my mother. Here is my amma. I cannot walk away from my mother who is poor and suffering. And I why would I want to? It is with my mothers at Prem Ghar that I am caught up into the sufferings and joys of life. I share in theirs and begin to see my own. It is there, with my mothers, that I might just learn to drink the cup of Christ, filled with all of the sorrows and joys of life.
Thank you, friends, brothers, sisters, mothers, fathers, for all of your love and prayers. I pray that you too might look around and see your mother, your son, your daughter, your father, and that you would love your family well.
Peace to you,