These Moms Won’t Miss the Pandemic. But Their Quarantine Habits Are Keepers.

Author - Umn ministry

May 09, 2021

Ten writers on the discipleship practices that shaped their families this year.

“America’s Mothers Are in Crisis” blared a February New York Times headline for an article arguing that mothers are “breaking” nationwide. Expected to do it all—work, homeschool, keep house, care for their families—many women left the workforce or hit a mental breaking point during 2020. But within the chaos, many Christian mothers are figuring out how to lean on their faith in new ways. Some moms are praying in new ways for and with their children or discovering spiritual formation habits inspired by staying at home during the pandemic. We asked ten mothers about what pandemic-inspired family discipleship habits they were hoping to cultivate or leave behind in the coming months and years.

Devi Abraham, Melbourne, Australia, writer and host of Where Do We Go from Here?, a podcast about sexual ethics

For our pandemic year, our sons studied at home and my husband worked from home, so we ate most of our meals together for the first time. Dining with two boys, seven and nine, ranged from the funny chaos of fart noises to deeper conversations about faith and mortality thanks to COVID-19. We prayed for our family in Germany, Sri Lanka, and Australia. We prayed for my sisters, both pregnant. We prayed that God would take the virus away.

Today, our lives in Melbourne are back to normal, but we keep meeting each other at the meal table. It is a practice that endures even when dinner is a bowl of two-minute noodles. It is impossible to ignore the climate in which we live, one where it seems as though the powerful can get away with anything and where the sounds of survivors are all around us, longing to be heard. I pray daily that my sons will recognize their weaknesses, that God will form in ...