Supreme act of faith

‎"Having a child is the supreme act of human faith"J.D. Kleinke author of Catching Babies

I posted this quote on my facebook page and I've kind of had it rattling around in my head ever sense. It has made me start to think about what faith is and what exactly do we have faith in as it pertains to childbirth. Here's a bunch of definations of this term: http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&client=firefox-a&hs=C9F&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&defl=en&q=define:faith&sa=X&ei=y5eETfeKG5S2sAPsnNn-AQ&ved=0CB8QkAE


From my own religion we have a scripture that says faith is something we hope for which is not seen but is true. I may be biased, but this is the one I like the best:) It's an interesting concept...to have hope for something that we can't see, touch, or understand. It sounds pretty crazy from some view points. But that is exactly what we do when we have children. We hope for something wonderful, transforming, sacred. Not just the whole birth experience, but the whole becoming a mother experience. We have a hope that we'll have a healthy child. We hope that we'll be able to feel a sense of control and wonder at the whole process. Birth centers around hope.

Then comes the tricky part...what is true. We hope that the medical profession knows what they are doing. We hope that our bodies will function correctly. We have hope that we will be respected. We hope that there is a larger picture to this whole life and that we can understand that. And many hope that some force/power/God out there is mindful of us and our desires to be good mothers, and who is watching over us as we birth.

What's true what's not...that's for each of us to decide. But I found faith to be a very powerful force behind birth and how women birth. It's often not acknowledge, but it's there. Whether you place your hope in medicine, your own self, or another person, it's there for us to discover and develop.

I'm not sure I'll come to any conclusions or great epiphanies with this post, but I feel the need to just acknowledge that that faith exists in most women. And that it exists within us as mothers. It's up to us to give it form and meaning. It's up to us to discover how that idea may transform us.