Our lives are moving before us as we fail to catch up. The world is fast, but God is slow. Silence is not found in a place, but deep inside our souls. Silence, speak less. The rule of Saint Benedict #21, “To prefer nothing to the love of Christ.” Keeping silence in the light of community. Your home is that community. And it is not silence as in the traditional notion of silence, this silence is a peace. This silence is holy. This silence as young mothers is the inner core of what we hope to achieve and pass onto our children.

I hear from many mothers whose lives are in tumult. They want peace. Life is chaotic, children are chaotic, don’t let anyone fool you. Our expectations are high but are kids are four. Their conscience is barely formed… We are shaping clay, God is the artist through our hands.

And this is hard. It is harder when we look to attain Christ’s holiness. Secular happiness is easy to achieve- a cheap bottle of wine and a night of debauchery. It will make you happy, but it will not sustain you. Why does the world tell us as mothers to run away from our vocations? We don’t need a break from our children, we need a break with God.

The focus of our lives has to be the mountain, we must surround it. From morning until evening, our lives could use some assistance from the likes of Saint Benedict. A focus on God. Rising early to study Him. Spending the day surrounded by Him. Treating our families as the monastery community and not trying to live in spiritual isolation, that is not holiness. 

Place the beautiful boundaries around your time with God. Don’t expect your children to get up late, you get up early. Sacrifice is hard but needed. We grow in beauty and holiness when we set limits around the mountain to make it sacred, just ask Moses.

If we cherish something, we protect it. We stay on guard. We surround it. If we keep our mountain sacred, we keep the center of our life, Jesus sacred. How else will we protect our time with him if we ourselves have no boundaries?

For Mother’s Day, give yourself the gift of discipline. Set yourself a routine. Rise early and protect your space with Him so that you can live in community with your family and not in isolation. Buy yourself a bible if you don’t have one. Head for the mountain.

Exodus 19:23

But Moses said to the LORD, “The people cannot go up to Mount Sinai, for you yourself warned us, saying: Set limits around the mountain to make it sacred.”