As a little girl there were many times I could not fully comprehend the gravity and intricacies of a given situation. Youth and lack of experience kept me in the dark. However, in some instances I simply looked at my mother's response and seeing her sorrow, I became serious and sad. I may not have understood the complete reason for her tears, but watching her grieve brought pain to my heart and made me sympathetic to the troubling situation.
The Church gives us a similar opportunity to walk with our heavenly Mother under the title of Our Lady of Sorrows, with the feast day of Sept. 15. But no matter what time of the year, it is always good to ponder the spiritual martyrdom of the Blessed Virgin Mary, to learn from her example of suffering, to apply that example in bearing with our own crosses, and to become compassionate to the sufferings of our neighbors.
As Mother of the Redeemer, Mary possessed a unique role in the drama of mankind's salvation. Far from playing the part of a passive bystander, she experienced Christ's Passion in a way no saint ever could.
The prophet Simeon foretold Mary's spiritual martyrdom when he told her, "Your own soul will be pierced by a sword" (Luke 2:35). Traditionally, Catholic devotion honors seven distinct sorrows of our Lady: the Presentation in the Temple, the Flight into Egypt, the Loss of Jesus for Three Days, the Way to Calvary, the Crucifixion, the Descent from the Cross, and the Burial of Jesus.
While each sorrow played a valuable role in salvation history, each was fulfilled by the climax of Christ's death on the cross. Many of Jesus' acquaintances and friends ran from Calvary in fear, but St. John tells us that Mary stayed with her Son on the cross (John 19:25). She knew her place, and she held it firmly.
From this position near the cross of Christ, the Blessed Mother shows us specifically how to suffer. First, she remained next to Christ – not off in a corner wallowing in her own grief. Secondly, she stood; she did not swoon or make a scene. She courageously bore the crushing blow of watching her Son die in agony, and her tranquility flowed from a docile spirit. Her directive from the Annunciation reverberated in the consummation of her Son's sacrifice on Calvary, "Father, into Your hands I commend my spirit" (Luke 23:46).
St. Bernard explained Mary's spiritual and emotional anguish poignantly when he wrote, "Perhaps someone will say: 'Had she not known before that He would die? Undoubtedly. 'Did she not expect Him to rise again at once?' Surely. 'And still she grieved over her crucified Son?' Intensely. Who are you and what is the source of your wisdom that you are more surprised at the compassion of Mary than at the passion of Mary's Son? For if He could die in body, could she not die with Him in spirit? He died in body through a love greater than anyone had known. She died in spirit through a love unlike any other since His."
Why was her love unlike any other since Christ's love? St. Teresa of Avila once said that to be a woman means to love and to suffer, and St. Gianna Beretta Molla pointed out that a person "cannot love without suffering or suffer without loving." Mary was the perfect woman. Her capacity for loving was greater than any other person's, and her capacity for suffering reached beyond our comprehension.
However, hers was not a suffering of despair. Even in her pain, though, our Blessed Mother remained sensitive to those around her. Jesus told her to take John as her son (John 19:26). What sacrifice it must have been to offer her perfect Son in exchange for broken humanity! Yet, she wholeheartedly embraced all of us and intercedes for us daily.
In our spiritual lives there may be times, when in our weakness and helplessness, we struggle to carry our crosses. Maybe we fail to understand the depth of Christ's sufferings, or the sufferings of our neighbors. If we look to the sorrowful heart of Our Lady, though, she will enlarge the capacity and sympathy of our own hearts to love at all cost.
Sister Mary Raphael is a member of the Daughters of the Virgin Mother, a community dedicated to serving the spiritual and practical needs of the sacred priesthood and of seminarians in the Diocese of Charlotte.