First, a question. Do you remember what colour robe the Bishop turned up in, two Sundays before Christmas? Rose pink. There are two days in the year when the clergy can wear pink. Today, Mothering Sunday, is the other one. But we haven't got a good pink vestment, and really pink doesn't suit me, and the blue we wear in Lent is good. It is one the colours for Mary, Jesus' mother, and we think about her today.

Next, the puzzle. Sometimes I get people to think about the letters in the word 'mother'. People think what words they can make, and I have to say what they have to do with mothers. Words like 'her' or 'therm', which is about keeping you warm. Always someone comes up with a particular word to defeat me. What might that be? We'll come back to that.

Today, then, we're thinking about mothers and those who look after us, or used to look after us, when some of us were much younger. The main thing is that good people do look after us when we are young. Often it is the mother and father we’re born with, but not always, and we might have brothers and sisters, who might help look after us. I had no brothers or sisters but was lucky, and I had a good father and mother. When I became a teenager at thirteen, in very different days from these, I lost my mother through illness, but ... I had one grandmother, one Godmother, and one aunt not far away, so was lucky.

When we are young, we get used to our family caring for us, but sooner or later will be grateful to them. And today is a day to thank our mothers. Love and caring must flow two ways. In our Bible reading, when Jesus is going to die on Good Friday, he cares about Mary his mother. If she is a widow by then, she needs the help of her family. A widow wouldn't usually have much of an income of her own. So, Jesus asks his friend John to care for her, and asks Mary to treat him as a son.

About only ten years after first becoming a teenager I became father, as you often did long ago, and the whole family story started up again. Our three children are all quite different, our six grandchildren are all very different. One grandson is 16 and well over 6' - how did that happen? One was until recently a little shrimp but is now growing and very good at tennis. One grandson is keen on the plants as I am. One granddaughter does ballet, which I certainly missed out on, but is also keen on solid geometry which is one of my things. The family would all still be very special even if they weren’t so interesting.

Now, another family. I have two cactus plants. One is a nice, neat, good-looking plant with lots of showy yellow flowers. The other gets too big, too prickly, and it doesn't have many flowers, but ….. the flowers are very big and mauve and white. I thought I would be a little bee, buzz, (some have sometimes called me a little b), and I did some pollinating, and one of the two plants had a seed pod. I sowed the seeds and now the two have babies. 109 babies a year and a half old. All different. Some are big babies like this, some tall like this one. This one is is pale and weedy – but it might have a very good flower, or lots of flowers, and baby no. 79 has two heads! I'm going to keep them for few years and see how they develop. A few might be really nice, and the rest will have to go.

That is the difference. In a human family you don't get rid of any, everyone always matters for ever. We should care for them as best we can for ever, even if they are a problem and a pain. 

Even more importantly, that is how God treats us. Everyone is one of God’s children, even if they have no idea about God, and God cares for everyone and values everyone, even if they are awful people. And if we know about God, we must also try to be like God, and care about everyone's welfare, even if they seem pretty horrible and a waste if space.

So, what else? Has anyone thought of the word to catch me out? XXX. Now mothers aren't usually interested in XXX. My mother wasn't interested in XXX. But I was, and she helped and encouraged me to do my own thing, which is what a good mother does.