This beautiful feast invites us to enter into the sorrow of
Mary at the Cross. Mary was not just a passive bystander, but an integral
participant at the cross. Her heart was
pierced seven times as only a mother’s heart could be as she watched her son
pierced and dying before her. Love is
authentic when we are sorrowful when a loved one suffers. This feast in fact was originally known as
“Our Lady of Compassion”. For the word
compassion comes from the latin, cum + passio – to suffer with.
Mary fulfills the second Beatitude: Blessed are they who
mourn, for they shall be comforted. Mary
mourns and suffers with Jesus. Yet, that
beatitude also refers to the mourning over sin.
We are blessed when we mourn that in sin we are separated from God. Mary
mourns not just for a dying son, but a son who died for sin, for our sins. Mary therefore weeps for us, we who so often
insufficiently mourn over our sins.
Saint John Paul II referred many times to our cultures “loss
of the sense of sin”. We slough off sin,
pretend that it doesn’t matter. Everyone
does it, so it must be okay. But no, sin
is abhorrent to the goodness of God. And rarely do we sufficiently grieve over
the great loss of grace which our sins bring. Mary mourns for those who refuse
to look upon the crucifix with contrite hearts.
Mary mourns for the baptized who so often continue to choose the empty
promises of the Evil One rather than the life-filled promises of Christ.
Mourning over sin is the only road to joy. For it is only then can appreciate what Jesus
did for us. Psalm 30 speaks of God’s promise to turn our mourning into joyful
dancing.
When we learn from Mary at the foot of the Cross of Jesus,
we also learn how to stand at the foot of the cross of all our brothers and
sisters who suffer, and how to bear courageously our own crosses. For even though she wept, she also trusted,
that Jesus suffering would bring about a tremendously greater good. So to, when we learn from Mary, we learn to
trust that our sufferings, born in union with Jesus, offered up to the Father,
can be a powerful force for good. So much grace can be won, when we bear our
sufferings with patience and trust, without complaint, without cursing God, but
to accept even our sufferings as an opportunity to unite our hearts to Christ
and to grow in His grace.
May the tears of Mary change our hearts, that we may bear
all things in union with Christ, for the glory of God and salvation of souls.
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