Actor and Christian celebrity Mark Wahlberg called his mom, Alma, first thing every morning. But her death in April of 2021 put an end to their daily chats. And now, Mark opens up about his grief and how he misses his mom every single day.
Mark Wahlberg may be a big-time actor. But no matter how busy Hollywood kept him, he always made sure to honor his mother’s one request — “Call your mother.”
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“Mark calls me from all over the world. Every single day,” Alma Wahlberg boasted in 2018. “I don’t care if it’s 3 o’clock in the morning!”
Once Mark Wahlberg made the commitment to call his mom every day, he stuck with it. Right up until Alma Wahlberg died at the age of 78. And with the devastating loss of his mom came the loss of their treasured daily routine, too.
“It was always the first phone call that I made every single day for the last 10 years, was to my mom,” he said, “And I don’t get to make that phone call anymore. And it’s heartbreaking. And that’s hard.”
Family and faith are now of the utmost importance to the Christian celebrity. But that wasn’t always the case.
Growing up, times were tough for Mark Wahlberg and his mom and siblings. And during his youth, Mark made some pretty poor choices. He even landed in jail after robbing a convenience store.
But those hard times, coupled with the love and support from his mom, eventually inspired Mark to surrender to his Heavenly Father.
“I had to make the choice personally, and then I had to focus on my faith,” he explained. “And my faith has really allowed me to overcome a lot of things.”
Once Mark made the decision to submit to God’s will, everything changed. He traded his troubled youth headed towards a life of crime for hard work and determination. And it paid off!
Mark Wahlberg And Siblings Honor Their Late Mom
Mark may have made it big in Hollywood, but his mom always measured his success differently. She made sure Mark Wahlberg’s net worth wasn’t found in fame or fortune but rather in faith and family.
“What made her most proud was us really kind of turning our lives around and becoming really productive people and the family-oriented people that we are,” the Christian celebrity explained. “She was most proud of the husband and the dad that I was. I mean, she always appreciated the successes and the things that I was able to do professionally, but the personal growth really meant something to her.”
It was hard on all of Alma Wahlberg’s kids when she began suffering from dementia. And her son Donnie Wahlberg of Blue Bloods and music group New Kids On The Block penned a beautiful tribute to her on Instagram.
“I’m so blessed to have been brought into this world by, raised by, taught by and set on my life’s path by, such an amazing woman,” he wrote. “It’s time to rest peacefully, mom.”
The emphasis Alma Wahlberg put on family and faith throughout her life has become her legacy. And her children are honoring her by pulling closer together.
Mark Wahlberg credits his sister for stepping up to try and fill the role his mom once played as the glue holding the family together.
“Now I have my sister who has really been an enormous support system for our entire family,” he said. “We’re now communicating much more than we were because everybody obviously was off doing their own thing and they’d be in their own lives. And now we’re constantly doing a multi-person FaceTime.”
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Moms truly are a blessing from God. And we should never underestimate the power of a mother’s prayer for her children!