(RNS) — A few months into her second pregnancy, Melissa Ambrosini realized she didn’t want to have another baby shower. The type of party that features gift exchanges, gender reveals and motherhood-themed games felt out of touch, she said.
However, Ambrosini, who lives in Brisbane, Australia, said she wanted to feel encouraged as she navigated having her second child. So she gathered her female friends for a mother’s blessing ceremony, a ritual of Navajo origins to honor women’s transition to motherhood.
“A mother’s blessing is not about that (gifts),” she said. “It’s about the mother, and it’s about supporting and loving that mother, making sure she feels really held, safe, seen and supported.”
According to practitioners, the ritual sacralizes birth and celebrates both the physical and spiritual changes mothers experience. For some spiritually curious women drawn to New Age practices, a mother’s blessing offers a more sacred approach to giving birth.
During the ceremony, participants, sometimes referred to as “sisters,” show support to the expectant mother through prayers, chants, and offerings.
Melissa Ambrosini in 2021. (Photo by Chloe Horder)
For those drawn to mother’s blessing ceremonies, pregnancy is a life milestone — like marriage or death — that calls for specific spiritual support, said Ambrosini.
“I have a very spiritual perspective on pregnancy as well, and I think everything is a spiritual journey, our whole life,” she said. “I feel like we are spiritual beings.”
Recalling her 2021 ceremony, she said it began with palo santo (“holy wood”) burning to cleanse the space of negative energies. Her best friend, the ceremony facilitator, then recited a “mother’s prayer” before guiding the guests sitting in a circle for meditation, Ambrosini said.
Then, a crystal ceremony was held, during which guests threaded crystals while offering good wishes for Ambrosini and her baby and reminiscing on their relationship. A red rope ritual, involving tying red wool threads around their left wrists, asked guests to bless the host and her baby.
The ceremony ended with a ritualistic sound bath, after which guests were given beeswax candles to light when Ambrosini entered labor.
For Ambrosini, the mother’s blessing marked the culmination of a yearslong spiritual journey. In her everyday life, she meditates and does breath work to feel …