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Mothering Sunday Near to the village of Etwall in South Derbyshire there is a chicken farm called Highfields Farm. This farm rears hundreds of chickens all free range producing hundreds of free range eggs every day. It’s known to the locals as Happy Hens Farm. But Highfields farm is known for something else as well. It gives a home to young people in trouble. It gives a home and work to teenagers who have been excluded from school because of really bad behaviour. Some of these youngsters have been violent or abusive to their teachers or their fellow pupils. Many of them are on drugs. All of them are headed for real trouble later in life, very probably prison. Few of these youngsters come from a stable home and family background. Most come from split, divided or dysfunctional families. They are only in their early to mid-teens and already these young lives are in a mess. And then they find their way to Happy Hens Farm. The farm is owned and run by Richard and his family. It’s a commercial operation run as a business selling free-range eggs to supermarkets. But there is another aspect to the work of the farm and its owners. They take in these youngsters and care for them when nobody else seems to know what to do. And amazingly they have a 100% success rate. When the young people arrive at the farm they are mostly headed for prison – that’s the way things are going wrong in their lives. But when they leave not one of them has so far found themselves in further trouble. All of them have returned to school or some form of education and got themselves jobs and settled down in life. Their year on the farm has made that much difference to their lives. Last year the Farm had a visit from Home Office Officials who came to see why Highfields Farm was so successful in dealing with these youngsters and helping them to straighten out their lives. Is it the country life? They asked. Is it the fields and the fresh air? Is it the rural environment freed from the fears and the temptations of the city? What is it that changes these young lives for the better? When Richard was asked at first he confessed that he found it difficult to find an answer. But then he came upon the real answer to Highfields Farm’s success. He said that every young person who comes to stay at the farm is welcomed and accepted and loved for who they are – regardless of what they have done. They are loved unconditionally. You see Richard is a good and sound Christian man. He himself had been subject to parental abuse and had found himself as a young teenager very firmly on skid row – his life headed for disaster. His salvation was that he had been fostered by a Christian couple and brought up in a Christian home. No-one tried to force Christianity upon him, but he knew that in that home he was loved and cared for unconditionally – and it was that which changed his life. Now through the work of his farm Richard tries to give to these youngsters what he himself has received and which had made such a difference in his life – unconditional love. Today is Mothering Sunday. And as we give thanks to God for the privilege of being a mother and for all that our mothers give to us or have given to us – so we give recall that unconditional love which is true love of a mother for a child. The story of Highfields Farm and the unconditional love shown to the youngsters there is a powerful testimony to the human need for unconditional love and therefore to the important role of our mothers and families in our lives. Love changes everything as the song says – and it does indeed. Love transforms lives. Children need that committed and unconditional love – the love which is found in stable loving family relationships - if they are to grow and prosper in their lives. All of us know that the family has been in something of a crisis for many years now. I am not wishing to be critical and I certainly need to be discreet. As you may know I hold Office Hour once a week where I meet couples about weddings and baptisms. The other night I had three groups came to see me – two about Baptisms, one about a wedding. Not one of them had behind them what I would call a normal family background – there was a really complex set of relationships between partners and children. It took me quite some time to sort out who belonged to whom! Now I don’t want to appear either critical nor judgemental because I don’t know all the circumstances – but it seems to me that what I came across is not unusual. But where is the stable loving and committed relationship that is unconditional and perseveres and remains faithful. How will children learn faithfulness and commitment and perseverance in relationships unless those things are shown them by parents who are themselves in that sort of committed relationship? And what effect does that have upon the children? We thrive on unconditional, committed, faithful love. We learn how to love in that way by being loved unconditionally ourselves. That is how love transforms lives and indeed transforms the life of society. There are some disturbing signs as well as some encouraging signs. Among the disturbing signs are the fear and the growth of violent crime – especially knife crime amongst young people. And then we hear from the press and television about very young children being harmed and abused in the cruellest way, by often very young parents or step parents or the mother’s boyfriend. The social workers tell us that they are overwhelmed with the work or trying to identify children who are at risk within their own home. I know it’s a minority – but it’s a worryingly increasing trend. Or there are children who find their sense of belonging and their identity not in their home but in a street gang often in violent rivalry with other gangs of similar kids. I wonder sometimes if we have allowed our Christian values around children and family life to be sidelined and marginalised in modern Britain to the detriment of our life as a nation. Things can change - people can change. Jade Goodie has had I suspect a very chequered place in our hearts. We have seen her as a loud-mouthed racist hungry for publicity and celebrity on that dreaded Big Brother programme. And now as she faces her terminal illness we see another side to her. Not only her courage – but also the love of a mother whose primary concern is for her children and their well-being both now and after she has died. She has married her partner to give a stable background for her children. The royalties paid by a magazine allowing them to cover the wedding have been put into a trust for her children and their future. She has had her children Baptized. She has shown herself to be a loving and responsible mother primarily concerned for the wellbeing of her children - and all in the most difficult of circumstances. The love of a mother for a child – perhaps the nearest that we can come in human life to the faithful, self-giving, unconditional love of God for each and every one of us. We need to celebrate that love as we do today. But also we need to celebrate the costly but wonderfully fulfilling, faithful, committed, persevering and unconditional love which God our Father pours into our hearts and which is the ground of all our human flourishing. |