Mother’s Day (Mothering Sunday)

Mothering Sunday falls on the fourth Sunday in Lent, three weeks before Easter. It is often confused with the US Mother’s Day holiday, which seeks to honour the role of mothers, and is often celebrated as a secular holiday in which children give their mother presents. Mother’s Day is celebrated in the UK on the same day that Mothering Sunday, but it has also been celebrated as a religious holiday by Catholic and Protestant Christians in many parts of Europe from the 16th century as a day when people went back to the towns or villages where they were born and baptised, to celebrate mass. Later on, it became a chance for domestic servants to have a day off to visit their own “mother church” and to visit their familes, so that over time it became a day when familes could get together without the demands of their working hours.