Nurslings

I remember when my oldest was a newborn, feeling that a divine grace was permeating our house and our beings. It felt as if angels wings were enclosed over us, creating a nest of safety and peace. As a midwife, I encounter that same sentiment when doing the postpartum visits, there is a deep sense of contentment and joy in the house, and all emanating from this one tiny, bundled creature! Recently, I came across this hadith which might provide a clue as to what that feeling exemplifies. In one hadith (sayings of the Prophet) the Prophet (pbuh) said, “If it weren’t for nursing children, bent-over old people and grazing animals, catastrophe would descend upon you like a flood” (Heysemi, Mecmau’z-Zevaid, X, 227). Thus, he pointed out that “sabiler” (babies in the nursing stage) are the first factor preventing divine wrath." The first factor in preventing divine wrath, isn't that amazing?

The following is a public service announcement from Puerto Rico encouraging breastfeeding. I think it is such a visual image of the grace and beauty that flows between a mother and her nursling. It shows babies of all ages and toddlers nursing. I could not imagine a public service announcement like this in America, our culture is so obsessed with breasts as a sexual image that we could never air something like this on television. But how effective it would be if we could...






The following is a trailer for a film, Formula Fed America, which portrays the low rates of breastfeeding in America in the context of a public health crisis. And if we look at the above hadith, I suppose we could think of it as a spiritual crisis as well!