Third Sunday Of September
Mary’s Sorrows
Preparation. - Filial piety requires us to recall Mary’s sorrows with sentiments, first, of compassion, and secondly, of contrition for our sins. When meditating on the Passion and bearing our daily trials, let us recall this admonition of the Holy Ghost: “Forget not the groanings of thy mother” (Eccli. 7. 29).
I. Mary’s Sorrows Demand Our Compassion.
To form an idea of the Blessed Virgin’s sufferings, we should have to understand the extent of her extreme and exquisite keenness of feeling, and the immensity of the love of Jesus that consumed her, a love which, already at the Incarnation, surpassed that of the whole heavenly court, and which, henceforth, until the Passion went on increasing every moment. Her love was the measure of her grief.
And also what tongue could express the anguish of that afflicted Mother? On the way to Calvary, and especially at the foot of the cross, an ocean of tribulation seemed to submerge her, and caused her a grief so bitter, that it would have been capable to bring on the instantaneous death of all men. And, as we know, so great a suffering was inflicted on the most sublime and innocent of creatures; on that immaculate Virgin, who is not a stranger to us, but is of our family, is our spiritual relative, and to say all in a word, who is the sweet and amiable Mother of our souls! Is not all this enough to pierce our heart with the sword of compassion?
Were a son unfortunately compelled to assist at the most unjust and cruel execution of her who gave him birth, were he to see her throbbing under the executioner’s axe, without being able to succor or relieve her, would he not feel as if his heart were a thousand times torn to pieces? And we, the children of the holiest and most loving of mothers, how can we behold her in the torments of Calvary and as if in agony at the foot of the cross, without feeling in our heart her very pains, her very sorrows, even more intensely than if they were our own?
What mother was ever more worthy of our tears and sympathy? She loses a Son she loves more than all mothers together can love theirs. She loses Him, innocent, most horribly and ignominiously put to death by those He loaded with benefits. He, indeed, has a heart of stone, who is not moved at this sight! My God, deign to soften my insensible heart.
Our Saviour has promised four graces to those who daily compassionate the sorrows of His Mother: first, a sincere repentance of their sins; secondly, a special assistance of Mary in trials and afflictions; thirdly, an habitual remembrance of the Passion and the salutary fruits accompanying it; and fourthly, the special protection of the Mother of sorrows.
O Blessed Virgin, enable me to deserve these favors by a tender devotion to thy maternal anguish, which snatched me out of hell and opened to me the heavenly Jerusalem. I purpose daily to recite seven Hail Marys to remind me of thy sufferings and to sympathize with them with a childlike heart. “Forget not the groanings of thy mother.”
II. Mary’s Sorrows Should Excite Us To Repentance.
When Jesus was in His agony on Calvary and Mary stood at the foot of His cross, had we asked the eternal Justice the cause of so bloody a drama, of a drama calculated to move all hearts to compassion, what answer would have been given us? No doubt these words of the prophet: “For the wickedness of My people have I struck Him” (Is. 53. 8).
O my God, it was, then, my own will and its sins that put my Saviour to death and pierced the heart of His and my Mother. I am, therefore, a criminal, a parricide, and if I were judged by human laws, death would be the penalty. And in the sight of God I have deserved eternal death with all its miseries. Who will penetrate my heart with a sufficiently intense sorrow to expiate my misdeeds? What tears powerful enough can ever preserve me from the avenging fire destined for my punishment? There are none on earth, save those of the two victims of Golgotha, immolated to obtain my forgiveness.
However, it is incumbent on me to add to their tears my sorrow, but a sincere and efficacious sorrow that will cause me to shun deliberate faults, to combat my feelings and my evil propensities. If I really repent of the past, I shall prove it by fleeing the world, its pleasures and habitual dissipation, by repressing my vanity, effeminacy, love of ease and sensuality. By these means I shall avoid the dangers of relapse, and my repentance, abounding in fruits of salvation, will correspond to the wishes of Jesus and Mary, for the object of their sufferings on Calvary is especially the destruction of sin and the reparation of our ruins.
O holy Virgin, afflicted Mother, how shall I again seek vain enjoyments on earth, where, on my account, thou didst experience all the prickings of the thorns of sorrow? To expiate my evil doings against thee, I henceforth condemn myself to the labors of penance and self-denial. Fill me with the spirit of compunction, of detachment from transitory goods and true devotedness. Strengthen my desire of following with thee the steps of Jesus crucified.
