What the Church means
The clearest teaching is in St John Paul II's apostolic letter Mulieris Dignitatem (1988). Writing of women who give up marriage for the Kingdom, he says that this renunciation "makes possible a different kind of motherhood: motherhood 'according to the Spirit'", for "virginity does not deprive a woman of her prerogatives" (MD 21). Then he adds the sentence that opens the whole subject: "Spiritual motherhood takes on many different forms."
Underneath it lies the truth he names in section 30: God entrusts the human being to every human being, but to women "in a special way". Spiritual motherhood is what a woman does with that entrusting — the souls placed near her, whether or not she carried them.
It also runs the other way. "And does not physical motherhood also have to be a spiritual motherhood," he asks, "in order to respond to the whole truth about the human being who is a unity of body and spirit?" (MD 21). A mother of six is called to spiritual motherhood as surely as a cloistered nun.
The pattern: Mary at the Cross
When Jesus therefore had seen his mother and the disciple standing whom he loved, he saith to his mother: Woman, behold thy son. After that, he saith to the disciple: Behold thy mother. And from that hour, the disciple took her to his own.
Mary was given a son she did not bear, at the hour of her greatest grief. The Council teaches that her Son is the first-born among many brethren, "namely the faithful, in whose birth and education she cooperates with a maternal love" (Lumen Gentium 63). Every spiritual mother learns from her: a motherhood received as a gift; exercised in prayer and presence; and never smaller for being unseen.
Even St Paul reached for the image. "My little children, of whom I am in labour again, until Christ be formed in you" (Galatians 4:19, Douay). John Paul II remarks that Paul, "as a man", felt the need to speak of what is essentially feminine in order to describe his apostolic work (MD 22). And Christ Himself said: "whosoever shall do the will of my Father, that is in heaven, he is my brother, and sister, and mother" (Matthew 12:50, Douay).
In every state of life
The mother of a family. St Augustine wrote of his mother Monica that she had "brought up children, as often travailing in birth of them" — he borrows St Paul's words from Galatians 4:19 — "as she saw them swerving from You" (Confessions IX.9.22). She bore them once and laboured for their souls for years. That second labour is spiritual motherhood, and it does not end when the children leave home.
The wife without children. The Church speaks tenderly here. A marriage to which God has not given children is not an empty marriage: its love "can radiate a fruitfulness of charity, of hospitality, and of sacrifice" (CCC 1654). The Catechism adds that couples who carry infertility can join that suffering to Christ's Cross, "the source of all spiritual fecundity", and can give themselves by adopting children or through demanding service to others (CCC 2379). None of this is a lesser vocation.
The single woman. At the close of Vatican II, St Paul VI said to women living alone: "Not even families can live without the help of those who have no families." The Catechism calls those who live single, often not by their own choosing, "especially close to Jesus' heart" (CCC 1658). The aunt, the godmother, the teacher, the nurse, the friend who prays: the Church sees them.
The widow. Monica was a widow through most of the years she wept and prayed for her son; Augustine calls her in those years "that chaste, pious, and sober widow" (Confessions III.11.20). Augustine remembered that she gave all of them "care such as she might if she had been mother of us all" (Confessions IX.9.22). Widowhood can widen the circle of a woman's motherhood rather than close it.
The consecrated woman. John Paul II describes her motherhood as concern for people, "especially the most needy: the sick, the handicapped, the abandoned, orphans, the elderly, children, young people, the imprisoned" (MD 21), in whom she finds her Spouse, according to His words: "as long as you did it to one of these my least brethren, you did it to me" (Matthew 25:40, Douay).
Mothers for priests
On 8 December 2007 the Congregation for the Clergy called for a worldwide movement of prayer, centred on Eucharistic adoration, for the holiness of priests, and spoke of "consecrated feminine souls" who "might wish to spiritually adopt priests in order to help them with their self-offering, prayer, and penance." The booklet it published widens that invitation explicitly:
Independent of age or social status, any woman can become a mother for priests. This type of motherhood is not only for mothers of families, but is just as possible for an unmarried girl, a widow, or for someone who is ill.
The same booklet tells of the mothers of Lu Monferrato, a village in northern Italy, who from 1881 gathered every Tuesday for adoration under their parish priest to ask God for vocations. It records that 323 vocations came from that village: 152 priests and 171 women religious.
How to begin this week
- Write down the names of the souls entrusted to you: children, godchildren, nieces and nephews, students, patients, a friend far from God. Pray for one name each day.
- Adopt one priest in prayer: your pastor, the priest who baptized you, or one you know is struggling. Offer one hidden sacrifice for him each week.
- Choose one work of mercy toward someone who has no one, and do it before Sunday.
- Offer the day's ordinary sufferings at its start. The Council teaches that the hardships of life, patiently borne, become spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God (Lumen Gentium 34).
A prayer composed for 1765 Regina
A prayer for the souls entrusted to me
Lord Jesus, from the Cross You gave Your Mother a son she did not bear,
and You gave every disciple a mother.
You know the souls You have placed near me —
those I carried, and those I never carried but cannot stop carrying.
Let none of them be lost; where my prayer falls short, let Yours be enough.
Make my love patient where it is tired, and wide where it has grown narrow.
Holy Mary, Mother of the Church, take my small motherhood into yours,
and bring every one of them to your Son.
Amen.
Questions
Can a single woman be a spiritual mother?
Yes. St John Paul II taught that "spiritual motherhood takes on many different forms" (Mulieris Dignitatem 21), and the Congregation for the Clergy wrote that "any woman" can become a spiritual mother for priests, including "an unmarried girl, a widow, or ... someone who is ill" (2007).
What is spiritual motherhood for priests?
A commitment to pray and offer sacrifices for the holiness of priests, often through Eucharistic adoration. In 2007 the Congregation for the Clergy, entrusting all priests to Mary, spoke of "consecrated feminine souls" who might "spiritually adopt priests" in this way; the booklet it published says that any woman, whatever her age or social status, can become a mother for priests.
Is spiritual motherhood only for women who cannot have children?
No. John Paul II taught that physical motherhood also has to be a spiritual motherhood (Mulieris Dignitatem 21). Every woman — mother, wife, single, widowed or consecrated — is called to it in her own way.