’One must unfortunately note that Europe seems to be going down the road which could lead it to take its leave from history.’ – Pope Benedict XVI, warning that Europe appears to be losing faith in its own future, calling some Europeans’ desire to have fewer children “dangerous individualism”. [Source: TIME, April 9, 2007]
It was refreshing indeed to read Eleanor's blog this morning. It was like a breath of fresh air! It brought some sanity into a world that is increasingly looking insane!
I am so tired of mothers trying to reinvent the wheel. Let's face it: so many women don't really want to be proper mothers anymore. They choose, instead, a career path; and if they have children at all, they have one as an afterthought and, as in the case of Faye Turney, abandon that one baby for others to raise. This, of course, is the height of selfishness! Women like Faye put their own needs and fulfilment above the needs of their babies. This is so wrong!
The fact of the matter is that babies cannot bring themselves up. They need nurturing, they need love and affection, and they need to be educated in the home (informal education), as well as in school.
Small wonder that we have so many young people going off the rails these days! They aren’t raised properly. They aren't given a proper start in life.
Faye, in a short interview on the BBC website, said that she had always wanted to be in the Navy from the age of ten. Really! Many boys and girls have fantasies about what they want to be when they grow up. Many boys at the age of ten wish to become astronauts. Only the fortunate few ever eventually manage to achieve their aims!
When we mature, we realise that life doesn't always offer us what we have always wanted for ourselves. So we have to adapt our lives to answer the needs of the day. This is called maturation and responsibility.
When a woman becomes a mother, she should put the child's needs above her own. This is normal and healthy. It is abnormal and unhealthy to put one's own needs above the needs of the child.
One cannot help but feel a little sympathy for Faye in the circumstances in which she now finds herself; but it has to be said that she would have been aware of the dangers she might place herself in before going out to sea with the Navy. One therefore has to feel far more sorry for her baby than for her. It is the baby who is the real victim in all of this, not Faye. One can only wonder about the emptiness that her child must be feeling, having to live its life with an absent mother.
Faye can say as much as she likes about being able to give the baby more material things when it grows up because she does what she does; but to say that is to miss the point completely. Children need love and warmth far more than they need material goods, as nice as it is to have those things.
Mothers can kid themselves as much as they like, but the fact remains that there is no substitute for a stable home, especially one where the mother is present. Anyone who has been fortunate enough to be able to remember coming home from school to mother after a hard day at school will understand exactly what I mean. There is no substitute for a proper, stable home, a home with a mother and a father.
©Mark Alexander
