It’s been said: “There are no tears like the tears of a mother.” And so, there is no sorrow like that of Our Sorrowful Mother Mary.
Imagine for a moment what she must have felt as she stood under the Cross on which her Son was hanging. The sorrow she felt then had been predicted. When Jesus was just eight days old he was circumcised and shed His first drops of blood for our salvation. The Jewish priest Simeon predicted then that a sword would pierce Mary’s heart (Luke 3: 35). It would not be a physical sword but one of sorrow—the pain and grief of a mother who had to watch her only son, her own flesh and blood, suffer terrible torture and die. And how her heart must have broken to hear Jesus tell her, “Woman, behold your son,” indicating the Apostle John. How could he ever take the place of her own Son?
This is the woman whom we honor today with a feast lest we forget or ignore the suffering that she experienced and which she united to her Son’s suffering for our salvation.
Though she shares in the glory of her Son in heaven, Mary continues to suffer and grieve. When with His dying breaths Jesus gave her to John, He gave her to all of us. We are sons and daughters of Mary. So how could she not suffer and grieve over the ongoing sufferings of the Church, the Body of Christ, her children?
On September 19, 1846, our Blessed Mother appeared to two children, ages 14 and 11, who were tending their families’ sheep in LaSalette, France. She was in tears and asked them to pray and to tell people they must stop offending God. She appeared again for eighteen times in 1858 to fourteen-year-old Bernadette in Lourdes, France. Her message included a call to pray for the conversion of sinners. In 1859 Mary appeared to a Belgian immigrant in Champion, Wisconsin and told her, “I am the Queen of Heaven, who prays for the conversion of sinners, and I wish you to do the same.” And in 1917 Our Lady appeared in Fatima, Portugal to three shepherd children once more with the message to pray the rosary and perform acts of penance for the conversion of sinners so that there might be peace in the world.
Clearly Our Lady of Sorrows continues to grieve over the sufferings of poor humanity for whom her Son suffered and died.
How can we console her? By responding favorably to her request that we obey God’s commandments and pray for the conversion of poor sinners. Our prayer is especially powerful when we offer it along with the sufferings that come our way. Doing so, we imitate Our Lady of Sorrows who united her sufferings to those of her Son as he offered Himself on the Cross for the salvation of souls.