By Liz Johnson, a wife, mother of four, and a birth doula in Northern Indiana.

As a birth doula, I see birth metaphors everywhere I go.  I’ll be driving down the street and find myself pondering how much that distant tree looks like a healthy placenta.  I hear a story of an airline pilot safely bringing a plane to land and I think of strong women and their guides, safely bringing children in the world.  I see ducks and ducklings crossing the pond and I find myself ruminating over whether human birth or poultry birth would be less comfortable.  And so it’s no wonder that when I read the story (and hear the beautiful music) of “Les Miserables,” I think of birth.

In this story, Jean Valjean is a recently paroled criminal with few resources and a hardened soul.  When he finds refuge with M. Myriel, the kindly bishop of Digne, he repays him by stealing his silver and fleeing into the night.  When he’s caught with this silver, Myriel doesn’t just pardon him, but covers for him and gifts him the silver, admonishing him to use it to become an honest man.  Valjean goes on to live a life of service and compassion, having been transformed by the love shown to him earlier.  At the end of the story, Valjean intercedes to save the life of the man his daughter loves, taking the wounded man from the battlefield and asking God to save this man’s life, even offering his own life in place.

God on High,
hear my prayer.
In my need,
You have always been there.

Giving birth has almost always been revered as a sacred time, one to be protected and honored.  It is also a historically dangerous time – there are still places in the world today where a woman has a 1 in 8 chance of dying in childbirth during her lifetime.  And while modern medicine and public health standards have helped lower maternal mortality rates in most countries, childbirth is still a tenuous time in a woman’s life.  Historically in the LDS church, women were sometimes anointed and given blessings by other women to protect them during childbirth, and today, many women are given priesthood blessings and are prayed for prior to (and during) childbirth.

She is young,
She’s afraid
Let her rest,
Heaven blessed.


As a doula, one of my many roles is to protect the sanctity of the experience for the mother and her family and to help guide her through this vulnerable experience.  Especially when a mother is giving birth for the first time, there is a lot of fear and uncertainty that can come into play – childbirth is an all-encompassing physical experience that can be frightening and overwhelming.  I have a role similar to that that was occupied by a woman’s mother, sisters, aunts, grandmothers, and other close friends historically – I am there to help her, guide her, buoy her, and reassure her.

Bring him home
Bring her home
Bring them home.

I would argue that childbirth is not only sacred, but a sanctifying experience.  It is one of many life experiences in which we dedicate ourselves to a higher purpose, and to God.  We set ourselves apart and consecrate our bodies to the creation of another person, putting ourselves at risk for the sake of another being.  It is a very tangible symbol of Christ’s atonement for us – as He spilled blood, so we spill blood.  As he endured pain for the sake of others, so we endure pain for the sake of others.

You can take
You can give
Let him be
Let her live.

It is no coincidence in my mind that the scriptures are heavy with birth metaphors to describe Christ’s atonement, and its relationship to us.  In John, Christ himself relates his upcoming death and resurrection to childbirth, saying “A woman when she is in travail hath sorrow, because her hour is come: but as soon as she is delivered of the child, she remembereth no more the anguish, for joy that a man is born into the world. And ye now therefore have sorrow: but I will see you again, and your heart shall rejoice, and your joy no man taketh from you.”  And how can we forget the phrase “born again,” usually used to suggest that a person has developed a relationship with (and perhaps a growing similitude to) Christ?   As such, when a woman carries a child and submits to the uncertainty and inherent selflessness of pregnancy and childbirth, she becomes, in some small way, a symbol of Christ.  She endures the discomforts, the pains, the fear – all for the higher purpose of bringing new life into the world.  It is often the first sanctifying experience of many in which a mother sets aside her will for the well-being of another.  Truly, as we give birth to another, we are ourselves in some ways, born again.

If I die,
Let me die
Let him live
Bring her home.

In “Les Miserables,” Jean Valjean endures his own travail of being born again – he is broken, abused, and disenchanted by his circumstances, but the love shown to him by the kindly bishop sets him on a path of love and forgiveness.  Yet I would argue that he’s born again in the story.  When his daughter’s young love, Marius, is preparing to battle at the barricade, Jean Valjean has every incentive to let the man go to fight.  Valjean could stay hidden, with his young daughter to care for him in his old age, and his longtime pursuer (Javert) will remain captive at the barricade and unable to arrest him.  Instead, he puts his own life on the line for both his daughter and Marius, mercifully freeing Javert and rescuing Marius from certain death.  He could have been arrested, wounded, or killed, but as he sings in the musical adaptation of the novel, he is willing to set aside his own needs, and even die, for those he loves.

Bring them home.
Bring them home.

And so, it is no wonder that when I come upon a woman heavy with child, perhaps uncertain with fear of what will be required of her to bring forth new life, or struggling through the more difficult parts of birth, I can’t help but relate these brave women to the courageous Jean Valjean.  They are putting themselves at risk for the love of another person, and what could be more Christlike?  And so, in my work with them, I pray – God on high, hear my prayer.  Bring this child home to its mother.  Bring this mother closer to God.  Bring them both safely home, a new mother with a new babe tucked safely in her arms.

Bring them home.