Father’s Day by Mamie Spring
Good Morning!
Happy Father’s Day to all our biological fathers, grandfathers, stepfathers, brothers, uncles…and all men here today. Even those of you who don’t have children of your own, or don’t see yourself in an official fathering role - whether you know it or not - your life is being used as an example for somebody who is watching you and choosing to follow in your footsteps. It may be in your neighborhood, at work, at church…you can be assured that someone is watching you and that puts YOU in the fathering role.
To start this morning, I’d like to say that my Father GOD, certainly has a sense of humor and my pastor, Rev. Charline was lovingly in on the joke when she asked me to do the lesson for today. I hesitantly, but quickly agreed to do it. But I’d like to share with you the conversation that GOD and I had on the way home. It went like this.
“Now GOD, why did Rev Charline as me to do a talk on the day that we celebrate Fathers? Rev. Charline knows I have daddy issues! She’s heard me talk about it on more than one occasion. Wouldn’t it be better for someone like Chryl-Ann or Cheryl P. to do the talk because I know that they had wonderful relationships with their fathers?”
And GOD said, after I took a breath,
“Yeah, it would’ve been good for them to do it…but your prayer at every gathering is …thank you GOD for this opportunity to love, to share and to grow…Perhaps sharing your experience, which was somewhat challenging, will be a catalyst for more growth in yourself and in others. And what do you have to say to that?”
“OK GOD!”
And here I am doing the talk on Father’s Day. Thank you Rev. Charline for helping me to grow.
For many years I found myself isolated on Father’s Day. When it was impossible to do so, I would make an obligatory visit, give obligatory gifts and well wishes. But I just felt that I had nothing to really celebrate because I was very disappointed with the fathers in my life. This disappointment was also my companion in the world and after becoming a truth student I began to understand why I often attracted relationships with men that were disappointing to me.
It is like you get what you ask for – “seek and you shall find.” I was asking for disappointment by focusing my attention on disappointment. Now it wasn’t everyday that I consciously thought about disappointments but it was an ingrained part of my belief system about men.
Now just in case some of my beloved sisters and brothers in the audience are feeling sorry for me and thinking, “Wow, Mamie needs to work on her father issues.”
I make a loving suggestion that you look at your life. Are you having difficulty and disappointing relationships with men or women in your life?
q Are you one of those women who say, “ there are no good men left!”
q Or when you are called to deal with a challenge in a relationship with a man, you find yourself thinking and sometimes saying, “See, I knew that they were all - BLEEP… BLEEP… BLEEP…!”
q You know, the unflattering terms that we sometimes use, “Are you one of those men who think that women are all GOLD DIGGERS and can’t be trusted?”
q Do you find yourself behaving like your father behaved although you swore that you’d never behave like he did?
If you answered yes to any of the above questions then I invite you to look closer at exploring and resolving your father issues.
Sometimes when feeling sorry for myself I’ve thought my plight was harder than other people because my mother had two husbands – thereby giving me two fathers with which to work out my issues. I had my biological father and my stepfather who entered my life when I was 7 years old. My stepfather was really my father figure and a grandfather to my children.
About 4 to 5 years ago, around Father’s Day, I facilitated an exercise in an ongoing women’s support group where participants paired up and told each other about their fathers. And at the end of the sharing, each participant introduced their partner’s father to the group.
Now, being the great therapist that I am, I knew what would happen. When introducing the other person’s father, the partner would definitely put a positive spin on what they heard. It’s just human nature. The average person is not going to say negative things about someone’s parent, even when the person has not been positive in describing them.
What the good therapist did not know is that I would have to participate because we were short of group members that night. I didn’t mind through, I was open to hearing a positive spin on my parent. But I wasn’t prepared for what I heard. When introducing my father, my partner didn’t even mention the things that had hurt me or that I thought were important. Instead, she said to the group,
“I would like to introduce Mr. Herbert Pinder, what a man! At age 25 he loved Mamie’s mother and her mother’s children so much that he took on a readymade family of – not 1 child, not 2 children but 3 children! He had never been married, he had no children of his own and his family did not agree with his decision to marry Mamie’s mother. So, here he is – going against his family, coming into a new family with no clue about raising children and yet EXPECTED to instantly be a good husband by Mamie’s mother and a good father by Mamie.”
As I think about my partner’s perspective I can add this to the scenario. Mamie was a 7-year-old little woman, going on 40, as they say and very angry because her parents were divorced and blaming her stepfather for her unhappiness. Actually, he was the easiest target.
When preparing for today, I thought about how often we hold others to extremely high standards. And that started me to thinking about where we get our information about role assignments as it relates to fathers? What should a father be like? What are his duties?
I’m taking a leap here, but I think that in the human psyche, the attributes of GOD, the FATJER is a standard by which human fathers are measured. The scriptures give us many names for GOD, the FATHER, and those names refer to GOD’s attributes. We’re told about GOD as PROVIDER, GOD as PROTECTOR, GOD as COMFORTER, GOD as LOVE, GOD as the ALL KNOWING WISE ONE…
Now, just imagine my 25-year-old stepfather who was told by his religion that he was to be the head of his household and trying to live up to those standards. Being the head, the one in charge, placed him in the position of Herbert the PROVIDER, Herbert the PROTECTOR, Herbert the COMFORTER, Herbert the as LOVE, Herbert as the ALL KNOWING WISE ONE.
It all sounds great! Doesn’t it? But these standards leave little room for immaturity, making mistakes, job layoffs, companies downsizing, economic challenges, fear, divorce, illness, personal disappointment, not knowing what to do in every situation. And what do you do when life happens and you don’t feel adequate to deal with it? Well usually you fight or take flight. My biological father took flight. My stepfather stayed but was so often in the fighting mode that he became hardened and lost in the day-to-day survival.
Has religion knowingly placed these pressures on fathers? Has society placed these pressures on fathers? Have wives and mothers placed these pressures on fathers? Have fathers and men placed these pressures on themselves? Are these pressures sometimes unreasonable? I would say yes to all of the above! And yet I don’t think that it was ever GOD’s plan for men – for fathers, to take on the responsibility of being everything TO everyone in their families.
The bible reminds us that,
“Of ourselves we can do nothing, and that GOD is the source of everything and that we are but one of the channels through which the source flows. We are never alone and we are not called to accomplish anything by ourselves.”
Having knowledge and believing it, certainly is the catalyst for tremendous growth in our lives. And yes, we strive to be the best that we can be with the understanding that we’re growing into our inherent perfection. There is a wonderful man that I’ve come to know and love in this church, who often says that he understands that he doesn’t have to be perfect in order to be effective. I believe that if I took a poll in this room right now almost every woman would agree with him. By agreeing, we’re saying that the men in our lives don’t have to go it alone. We’re saying that we’re willing to stand with them. We’re saying that we understand that we’re in this thing called life together.
So on behalf of myself, the women in this room and the enlightened women of the world, I extend an invitation to all the men here and men everywhere to open themselves to receive the support that is available to you. We want to support you. We are proud of you. We see and appreciate your efforts. You don’t have to be superman for us to admire you. You don’t have to be a tower of strength every hour of the day for us to believe in you. We are willing to stand with you and assist you to accomplish the things that you want to accomplish. For those of you that are developing your millionaire consciousness, know that we’re patient and applaud your present work ethics. And though some of you are not in your dream careers yet, know that we see and appreciate the daily sacrifices that you make for your family. Everyone does well when things are going good, but it’s your walk through adversity that has set the greatest example of love and courage.
That exercise that I told you about earlier - the one that forced me to take a different view of my earlier life with my stepfather – set me on a path of growth and healing. It demanded that I begin to look for the good in my fathers in particular and men in general in order to experience better relationships with all the men in my life, including my own sons. So, by the time I arrived at Unity Center of Miami I was on a path of reconciliation and able to see great good in the men of this church.
And today, on Father’s Day, I applaud your unselfish commitment to this ministry. I hope that you know that your commitment is contributing to the lives of others. I also applaud the example that you set for your families and others by the commitment that you’ve made to you own spiritual growth. It has been said that relationships are our master teachers. And as a truth student I’m always asking what did you come to teach me?
All of my fathers, GOD the FATHER, my ELDER BROTHER JESUS, my biological father and my stepfather have taught me about love, about forgiveness…the greatest lessons of all.
My stepfather made his transition last year and I would love to end this talk by saying that we were the best of friends when he died, but we weren’t. But I can honestly say that by the time he left the earth plane I was able to identify and appreciate the good that he brought to my life. I understand that he is on a soul journey just like me, doing the best he knows how based on his level of awareness.
I invite you to join me in praying for all men and fathers of the world.
Centered in the Peace of Spirit, we release all hurt feelings, misunderstanding, injustice and judgments. We are forgiving and loving to ourselves and to all people. We live from a place of peace within and we are blessed as we bless each person and situation in our lives. We now assume an attitude of appreciation for all the father figures that life has brought our way. We affirm for these men and men everywhere, great Health, great Wealth, great Love and great Spiritual Unfoldment. So it is and so we let it be …Amen!