Studying Spiritual Midwifery briefly but intensively in the 1990’s taught me that motherhood is powered by passion.
But most.of us now cannot handle it.
Has there ever been a more tender, emotionally explosive and honest motherhóod movie than Lynne Ramsay’s “Die My Love”?
Geoff Fox December 1, 2025, Melbourne, Australia
On the 8th of August, 1903, Javanese princess and common people’s advocate Raden Ajeng Kartini wrote of a deeply meaningful meeting she had with a village midwife:
“Just now we have company; at the table where I sit there are five of us working. Justinah the wise woman came this morning and will stay until next week. We think her a treasure. She spends her time here usefully, teaches embroidery and is so severe when we are careless. When we make a mistake, she immediately pulls everything out. How rich I felt this morning when she laid her hand trustingly on my shoulder, while I explained something or other to her. Now she feels at home with us; I look with so much pleasure into her fine intelligent eyes; they say so much.
She is a dessa-child. Oh, how full of love is her calling! You would enjoy meeting her. She listens with attention when one speaks, and then asks such intelligent questions. If you ever come to our neighbourhood again, I hope to be able to take her to you. This clever little woman has already attended forty-eight women in child-birth, and she is such a young thing still, with all a child’s eagerness.”
Exactly one hundred and ten years years later on the 8th of August, 2013, I was blessed to meet an astonishimg Indonesian man, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, (SBY), who rose from birth into a lower middle class family in the very small village of Tremas (about 8 kilometre north northeast of the alun-alun in Pacitan on the glorious south coast of East Java) to become the first two-term democratically elected president of his homeland, Indonesia, the fourth largest nation on earth.
I told SBY in that very brief meeting a little bit both about the results of my cross cultural engagement with a wonderful grassroots man, Mr Syukur Kuseke, the traditional owner of Air Kaca, a national heritage (cagar budaya) site in Morotai and about my dad’s time in Morotai in World War Two. SBY said that he would like to visit Air Kaca. The president met very many people that day so my time with him was limited, but, as I left the room in the presidential palace, SBY’s eyes followed me with a child like eagerness to know more that I will never forget.
Alhamdullialh.
I praise the Lord for allowing me that treasured memory of meeting SBY.
The villages of the world are frequently where the greatest joys and purity are found, created and nurtured for us all.
Mbah Jeff (sudah tua), December 2nd, 2024, Melbourne, Australia
MOTHERHOODS MATTER 