Mother’s Day traditions

Besides observing Pentecost on Sunday, Mother’s Day will be celebrated throughout the world. The idea to honor and pamper all mothers once a year – the second Sunday in May – is more than 100 years old and originates in the U.S. In 1907, exactly one year after her mother died, Anne Jarvis from Philadelphia had the idea to choose a day to thank mothers all over the world for their love and unselfish care. The idea became a reality one year later.

Philadelphia was the first town in the world to celebrate Mother’s Day on May 10, 1908.

Six years later, President Woodrow Wilson officially proclaimed the second Sunday in May as Mother’s Day.

In the following years, Mother’s Day became popular in India, China, Mexico, Scandinavia and Switzerland. The first Mother’s Day in Germany was celebrated in 1933. In the initial years in Germany, mothers were not honored for their devoted work but were rewarded for the many children they had.

In 1938, Adolf Hitler awarded mothers with the “mother’s cross” to honor their outstanding help against low birth rates and death. Each year in August, on the birthday of Hitler’s mother, he gave the bronze medal to mothers with four children, the silver medal to mothers with six and the gold medal to mothers with eight children.

After the war, it took a while until Germans started celebrating Mother’s Day again. People still had terrible memories of the past, as well as the current miserable situation on their minds; they didn’t feel like calling special attention to something that should be normal and taken for granted.

Today, it’s customary for children throughout the world to behave extremely well on Mother’s Day, do something nice such as preparing breakfast, giving cards, flowers, handcrafted items or other gifts. Despite the commercialism – gifts get bigger and more expensive each year – children should honor and take good care of their mothers every day, not only on Mother’s Day.