What I know for Sure

about Womanhood and Motherhood
(Hey, I figure if Oprah and Sheri can do it- then I can do it too)

•Satan has waged war on womanhood and motherhood. He has used every tactic imaginable to deceive us about who really we are and what our purpose in life really is. He works not only to deceive women about their role but also to deceive men about women’s divine role.

Sheri Dew: Have you ever wondered why prophets have taught the doctrine of motherhood—and it is doctrine—again and again? I have. I have thought long and hard about the work of the women of God. And I have wrestled with what the doctrine of motherhood means for all of us. This issue has driven me to my knees, to the scriptures, and to the temple—all of which teach an ennobling doctrine regarding our most crucial role as women. It is a doctrine about which we must be clear if we hope to stand “steadfast and immovable” regarding the issues that swirl around our gender. For Satan has declared war on motherhood. He knows that those who rock the cradle can rock his earthly empire. And he knows that without righteous mothers loving and leading the next generation, the kingdom of God will fail.

• I know that motherhood has the power to change lives. Not only the lives of our children or those we mother, but it has the profound power to change our lives as well.

David O. McKay: Motherhood is the greatest potential influence either for good or ill in human life. The mother’s image is the first that stamps itself on the unwritten page of the young child’s mind. It is her caress that first awakens a sense of security; her kiss the first realization of affection; her sympathy and tenderness the first assurance that there is love in the world. Mothers sow the seeds in childhood that determine to a great extent life’s harvests in adulthood. A mother who instills into the souls of her children respect for one another and love for motherhood and fatherhood, renders a great service to the Church and to humanity in general. Children from such homes go out into the world as good citizens—citizens who will render the service which their parents have rendered, to fight the battles which their fathers and mothers have fought.

• I know that through womanhood and motherhood we can find true happiness, fulfillment and joy.

Joseph F Smith: There can be no genuine happiness separate and apart from the home, and every effort made to sanctify and preserve its influence is uplifting to those who toil and sacrifice for its establishment. Men and women often seek to substitute some other life for that of the home; they would make themselves believe that the home means restraint; that the highest liberty is the fullest opportunity to move about at will. There is no happiness without service, and there is no service greater than that which converts the home into a divine institution, and which promotes and preserves family life.

• I know that women are blessed with special gifts that make mothering possible.

Gordon B. Hinckley: “God planted within women something divine.” That something is the gift and the gifts of motherhood. Elder Matthew Cowley taught that “men have to have something given to them [in mortality] to make them saviors of men, but not mothers, not women. [They] are born with an inherent right, an inherent authority, to be the saviors of human souls … and the regenerating force in the lives of God’s children.”

• I know that motherhood is more than bearing children. I know that we can mother children we have not born.

Sheri Dew: When we understand the magnitude of motherhood, it becomes clear why prophets have been so protective of woman’s most sacred role. While we tend to equate motherhood solely with maternity, in the Lord’s language, the word mother has layers of meaning. Of all the words they could have chosen to define her role and her essence, both God the Father and Adam called Eve “the mother of all living” —and they did so before she ever bore a child. Like Eve, our motherhood began before we were born. Just as worthy men were foreordained to hold the priesthood in mortality, righteous women were endowed premortally with the privilege of motherhood. Motherhood is more than bearing children, though it is certainly that. It is the essence of who we are as women. It defines our very identity, our divine stature and nature, and the unique traits our Father gave us.

Sheri Dew: As daughters of our Heavenly Father, and as daughters of Eve, we are all mothers and we have always been mothers. And we each have the responsibility to love and help lead the rising generation. How will our young women learn to live as women of God unless they see what women of God look like, meaning what we wear, watch, and read; how we fill our time and our minds; how we face temptation and uncertainty; where we find true joy; and why modesty and femininity are hallmarks of righteous women? How will our young men learn to value women of God if we don’t show them the virtue of our virtues? Every one of us has an overarching obligation to model righteous womanhood because our youth may not see it anywhere else.

• I know that motherhood is that hardest thing I have ever done. It requires more selflessness and sacrifice, more time and energy, intelligence and spiritual awareness, patience, love, determination, and faith than anything else I have ever done. I know that being a good mother is different and harder than simply bearing children. I believe that through the process of mothering others we learn and grow and become more like God. I am not sure that there is any other work in life that can compare to the work that true, righteous motherhood requires.


• I know that the love will bless us in our efforts to love and nurture those we are given to mother.

Joseph F Smith: I believe that every mother has the right to … know what to do in her family and in her sphere, over her children, in their guidance and direction; and that mother and every mother possessing that spirit has the gift of revelation, the gift of inspiration and the gift of knowledge, which is the spirit of prophecy, the spirit of discernment, a gift of God to them, to govern their households and lead their children in the path of righteousness and truth.

Happy Mothers Day one and all!