Mothers' Day

I listened in church this morning to the usual kind words spoken about mothers, but none of them were as dramatic as the Mothers' Day sermon I heard the second Sunday of each May, growing up in the Anglican Church. The Reverend Canon Charles Frederick Arthur Clough was the shepherd who saw us through those depression years, caring with tenderness and kindness and a great generosity, both spiritual and material.

He was never known as anything but "The Canon" in our house.




He came to Canada as a young English Curate to serve in the Canadian West, early in the last century.

He was a Judge in Juvenile Court; he was for many years the President of the Red Cross; he was a great proponent of the Boy Scouts, and at St. Faiths he and Henry White provided one of the best Scouting organizations in the West.

With all of these great attributes he was prone on special occasions to preach the same sermon, and his Mothers' Day sermon always ended with great flair as he quoted this poem by Rudyard Kipling.

Mother o' Mine

If I were hanged on the highest hill,
Mother o' mine, O mother o' mine!
I know whose love would follow me still,
Mother o' mine, O mother o' mine!

If I were drowned in the deepest sea,
Mother o' mine, O mother o' mine!
I know whose tears would come down to me,
Mother o' mine, O mother o' mine!

If I were damned of body and soul,
I know whose prayers would make me whole,
Mother o' mine, O mother o' mine!

Rudyard Kipling

In the back row of the junior choir some of the more irreverent girls said it softly along with him!!!