The pain of Mary
Mary, at the cross, is the “Strong Woman” of Scripture, who contemplates her son, flayed and crucified. “The mother of Jesus, his sister, Mary of Cleophas, and Mary Magdalene stood near the cross. Jesus, looking at his mother and the disciple he loved, said to his mother: ‘Woman, behold your son’! Then to the disciple: ‘Behold your Mother'”! (John 19:25-27). Mary becomes Mother of Men through her participation in the sacrifice on Calvary, and it is at the most dramatic moment of her Son’s life that her spiritual motherhood is revealed. Her presence at the cross represents the high point of her association with Christ’s salvific mission. Her sufferings, offered in union with the Redeemer Son, constituted the most important act of her spiritual motherhood. “Mary contemplated the wounds of the Son, while all fled. She stood firm. The Son hung on the cross, the Mother offered herself to the persecutors,” (St. Augustine, *De Institutione Virginum*, *Patrologia Latina* 16, 318).Christ dies, and His mission is accomplished, but Mary’s mission begins. In the regeneration of humanity, she is the new Eve, therefore, the Mother of the redeemed through intimate association with Christ. As such, her mission encompasses, as filters, all those associated with God’s grace to Christ. This new mission of Mary is necessary for the completeness of redemption: it is the source of Mary’s function in relation to the Church and the worship rendered to Mary.Hilary of Poitiers (d. 367) speaks of the Desolated One, to whom the Son wished to give, under the cross, the comfort of another filter in the person of the apostle John: “The Lord said to both, ‘Woman, behold your Son'” and to John, “Behold your Mother” (Hilary of Poitiers, *Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew*, 27, 56), in order to ensure, through the disciple, the love of a son for the comfort of the desolated mother. Saint Anselm of Aosta (1033-1109), in various works, presents us with a suffering Mary: “O merciful Mother, what tears did flow from your most compassionate face while you saw your Son God stretched out, without guilt, on the cross?” (Saint Anselm of Aosta, *Oratio XV ad Christum*).From the 11th century, devotion to Our Lady of Sorrows developed, which would be invoked with titles such as Desolated One, Virgin of the Seven Sorrows, Piety, *Soleád* (Spant), *Vesperbild* (German). Prayers and practices developed, in particular the *Via Matris*, in which one seeks to unite Jesus’ sufferings with Mary’s, to have a clearer image of the Co-Redemptrix. With the Synod of Cologne in 1423 (Feast of Compassion), public worship of Our Lady of Sorrows was established, in opposition to the teresia of the tussitas, who destroyed images of Mary the Sufferer. Benedict XIII, in 1727, fixed this memory on the Friday of Holy Week. After the latest liturgical reform, the celebration of Our Lady of Sorrows is on September 15, immediately after the Exaltation of the Holy Cross, celebrated on September 14 of the same month. In various places, there is a particular celebration of Our Lady of Sorrows on the morning of Holy Saturday.Today, more than ever, the figure of Our Lady of Sorrows is relevant. Many mothers have experienced the slavery, abduction, and violence; mothers who have seen their children under the cross of turbulent violence, victims of terrorism and hatred. The inner attitude of each faithful, on the Lenten path, should be to participate, like Mary, in Christ’s liberating work, to be with him on the way to Calvary that leads to Light. “Through the cross to the light.” Cultivating a particular devotion to Our Lady of Sorrows becomes especially relevant in this time laden with egoism, wars, violence, and suffering. All the world’s pain passes through the “Mater Dolorosa,” who incessantly prays for us.The Immaculate and Painful Heart of MaryOn October 13, 1917, the Lady presented herself as Our Lady of the Rosary to Lúcia, Francisco, and Jacinta, the three shepherd children of Fátima. But already on June 13, 1917, she had told Lúcia that she would live longer than Francisco and Jacinta, because “Jesus wants to use you to make Me known and loved. He wants to establish in the world the devotion to My Immaculate and Painful Heart. To whoever accepts it, I promise salvation, and these souls will be loved by God as flowers placed by Me to adorn His throne.” Lúcia was troubled, and Mary added: “Do not be discouraged, I will never leave you. My Immaculate and Painful Heart will be your refuge and the path that leads you to God.” Lúcia remembered: “Before the palm of Mary’s right hand, I saw a heart crowned with thorns that seemed to be driven into it. We understood that it was the Immaculate and Painful Heart of Mary, wounded by the sins of humanity, asking for reparation.”The phrase “Painful Heart” is added to the description of Mary’s Heart because the graphic representation clearly shows that it is the Painful Heart: the heart, a symbol of love, does not only bear the crown, indicating the intensity of Mary’s love for us, but also the thorns, which clearly signify the suffering of Mary’s Heart. Devotees of the Heart of Jesus, according to the presentation made by Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque, know that the thorns around the Heart of Jesus indicate that Jesus loves, but is not loved in return. Therefore, he suffers and asks for a more intense love to repair the time when we did not love him as we should, and also for those who do not love him as they should.This mode of presenting the Heart of Mary is new, because until then, Mary of Sorrows was depicted with a heart pierced by one or seven swords, to remember Mary’s past sorrows (the seven sorrows, or the sword prophesied by Simeon in Lk 2,35), or, more simply, with a heart crowned with roses, which obviously implies the presence of thorns.Saint Alphonse writes: «Pelbarto was revealed to Saint Elizabeth that Saint John the Evangelist, after the Virgin’s Assumption into heaven, desired to see her again. He obtained this grace: his beloved Mother appeared to him, and with her, Jesus Christ. He then understood that Mary asked the Son for some special grace for her devotees of her sorrows, and that Jesus promised them, four principal graces: that whoever invokes the divine Mother for her sorrows, before death, will merit to perform true penance for all his sins. That he will protect these devotees in the tribulations they face, especially at the time of death. That he will imprint upon them the memory of his passion, and that in heaven, he will give them the reward. That he will place such devotees in Mary’s hands, so that she may dispose of them as she pleases and obtain all the graces she desires» (Saint Alphonse de Ligori, The Glories of Mary, Discourse IX, «The Sorrows of Mary»). And the same Saint Alphonse concludes by telling the conversion and salvation of a great sinner who was saved precisely through his devotion to Mary’s sorrows (Saint Alphonse de Ligori, The Glories of Mary, Discourse IX, «The Sorrows of Mary»).It is attributed to Saint Brigid, a great devotee of Jesus’ Passion and Mary’s Compassion, the revelation of the seven most particularly painful moments in the life of Our Lady:– In the prophecy of Simeon, when she learned she would suffer for her Son Jesus (Lk 2,33-35)
– In the persecution of Herod and the flight to Egypt (Mt 2,1-23)
– In the loss of Jesus in the Temple of Jerusalem (Lk 2,41-51)
– In the encounter with the Son carrying the cross on the way to Calvary (Mt 27,31-33)
– In the crucifixion and death of Jesus (Jn 19,25-27)
– In the descent from the cross, when she received in her arms the battered and dead body of her Son (Jn 19,31-38)
– In the burial of her Son, when she laid Jesus in the tomb, while she remained in sad solitude (Jn 19,39-42)Still Saint Brigid, in her approved revelations by the Church, states that Our Lady promised to grant seven graces to whoever recites seven Hail Marys each day in conjunction with her Sorrows or Tears:– I will bring peace to their families
– They will be enlightened regarding divine mysteries
– I will console them in their sorrows and accompany them in their labors
– I will give them all they ask for, provided it does not contradict the adorable will of my divine Son and the sanctification of their souls
– I will defend them in spiritual battles against the infernal enemy and protect them at every moment of life
– I will assist them visibly at the moment of death
– I have obtained from my Son that those who propagate this devotion (to my Tears and Sorrows) will be transferred from this earthly life directly to eternal happiness, for all their sins will be destroyed, and my Son and I will be their eternal consolation and joy.We also add the promise made by Our Lady to Sister Lucia of Fatima on December 10, 1925: «Behold, daughter, my Heart crowned with thorns, which the ungrateful moments continually pierce with blasphemies and ingratitudes. At least, you try to console me, and say that I promise to assist, at the hour of death, with all the necessary graces for salvation, all those who, on the first Saturday of five consecutive months, confess, receive Holy Communion, pray the Rosary, and have compassion on me for a quarter of an hour, meditating on the fifteen mysteries of the Rosary, with the intention of offering me reparation».Why so many promises, in private revelations, to encourage the faithful to recite the Sorrows of Mother of Jesus and ours? Jesus loves Mary because she is his Mother. He knows how much she suffered in union with him for our salvation. We were saved from hell by the most dolorous Passion of Jesus Christ, the only Redeemer, to which Mary associated herself in an incomparable manner through her Compassion at the foot of the Cross. Everything that Jesus suffered in his body and heart, Mary suffered in her heart with a maternal pain that no other creature has known. It is in this sense that traditional spiritual practice attributed to her the title of «Co-Redemptor»: not as a second redeeming cause, but as the one who, among all creatures, most fully united her own suffering to the sacrifice of the Son. This heart that loved thus deserves our deep veneration and filial gratitude.Mary, the Lamb, Servant of the LordThe Second Vatican Council teaches that Mary suffered deeply with her Only-Begotten, associating herself with a maternal spirit to his sacrifice, lovingly consenting to the immolation of the Son she had generated, steadfastly maintaining, under the Cross, the faithful consent given at the Annunciation (Second Vatican Council, Dogmatic Constitution Lumen Gentium).At the Cross, Mary is the Lord’s handmaid (Lk 1:38-48), the perfect icon of service (Is 53), the Lamb of God (Jn 1:29-36). A servant lamb, patient and strong in pain (Acts 8:32), “without spot or wrinkle” (1 Pt 1:19), whose sacrifice is sin-bearing and perfect (Jn 1:29-36), expiating and removing sin from the world. To the Son, the Father, in the power of the Holy Spirit, she gives a “generous and humble servant companion,” full consent, acceptance, dependence, and loving detachment. Mary, the “companion of Christ,” is not merely a “yes” to God’s Word, but participation in the death and glory of the Son. Indeed, at the foot of the cross, her maternal cooperation in the mission of the Savior was accomplished simultaneously through her actions and sufferings (Lumen gentium 61).By this extraordinary and formidable “maternal cooperation,” Mary, the humble Servant of the Lord, assumes in a surprising way the traits of the Servant of God, the Lamb without spot, chosen to bring to completion the wonders announced by the prophets. “At the Cross,” Mary is the Lamb’s Servant who gave birth to the Lamb for sacrifice. The adventure of the young woman of Nazareth, begun with the mystery of the Annunciation, unfolds mystically throughout the public life of the Son and reaches its climax at Calvary, at the foot of the cross: “The pain of the Mother of God is great as the sea. She is immersed in it, but it is a restrained pain: she holds her heart firmly with her hand so that it does not break. The true death appears in a terrifying way in the open mouth of the Savior. But his head turned towards the Mother, as to console her, and the cross is all light: the crossbeam of the cross has become the light of Christ” (E. Stein).The Lamb, associated with the sacrifice of the Lamb, icon of the Church as bride, suffers, in her own compassion, the passion of the Son, giving her consent to that sacrifice with her maternal love. At the Cross, the holy Virgin cooperates in salvation. She is the offering Virgin, crucified in her heart because she is indissolubly linked to the crucified Son. At Calvary, the union of the Mother with the Son is consummated in a sea of pain and charity at the same time. Both the Lamb and the Lamb’s Servant offer a single holocaust: “There was then one will in Christ and Mary, and they offered together a single holocaust: she, in the blood of her heart. He, in the blood of his flesh” (A. de Cîteaux).Inevitably, the title of Lamb refers to no less suggestive and evocative biblical title, the New Eve, due to her special cooperation in salvation. Mary is associated with Christ in the work of salvation, as Eve was companion to Adam in the work of death. The liturgy proclaims Mary: “The Virgin cooperator and minister of the new covenant of salvation that offers the Lamb without spot” (Masses of the Blessed Virgin Mary). Mary is thus the New Eve, the Virgin who recapitulates the trial, living to the full her vocation as a Virgin Mother, in a world wounded and seduced by evil: the strong Mother, open to the Word, living to the full her vocation as a fertile Virgin Mother, icon of God’s maternal love, which transcends all love.At Calvary, the Lamb gives the Holy Spirit to the Lamb’s Servant (Acts 19:26) and the tomb of John, “the disciple whom he loved” (John 19:26). The title of Lamb also reveals Mary’s intimate bond with the Church (Lumen Gentium). (63), such that it is said of the “journey between Mary and the Church, in such a way that each of the two can only be conceived in the other and with the other”. The Church, like Mary, is indeed called to share the destiny of the Bridegroom Lamb, crucified and risen. Mary, finally, on the Cross, is the silent lamb, a contemplative presence, more eloquent than words, consumed by the flames of the Holy Spirit in an interior holocaust: she is the “burning bush”, a presence carried within her to such a degree of incandescence that she is totally identified with the death of her Son.The Tears of Humanity
What does the Virgin, in tears, say to each of us? She sings because we do not recognize the coming of the Son, because we do not yet welcome Him as our Lord. Mary suffers for the sin of indifference, for the infinite forms of paganism that distance us from the love of the Son. No longer do we have a contrite and troubled heart. In families, as in parishes, the “sense” of sin has weakened. While God suffers for our daily offenses, we indulge in dozing off and domesticating our conscience of sin. However, it is not made holy who is not marked by the wound of the sword that pierced the Heart of Jesus and Mary. Let us learn to sing for our sins, to have suffering in our souls when we are against God. The first commitment of a genuine conversion is to reopen the wound of the heart and the tears of the eyes, because we are far from love.
The Tears of Jesus and Mary
At the feet of the Virgin of Sorrows, it is spontaneous to reflect on the tears of Jesus. Why? Bowing down before the Virgin of Sorrows is to feel a heart impulse that plunges into the tears of Christ. He, still foolish, as in Jerusalem then, says: “Behold, they will throw you down, you and your children, within you. They will not leave a stone upon a stone in you, because you did not recognize the time when you were visited” (Lk 23:31). Jesus quotes and reveals his passion for us. Grieved by the evil we committed, he uses mercy without threats or punishments. He sows tears, but not without joy. Giving his life, he reaps our love (Ps 126:3).
Mary participates in the tears of the Sower. And if the Son suffers for the sins of men, she cannot fail to be solidary in body and spirit. The most incisive icon of this divine solidarity is the Crucified, before whom Mary lets herself be enveloped by an eternal “yes” to the Father’s will. And the voice from on high exclaims: “Behold your Mother” (Mt 27:56). In this affirmation, the tears of Jesus and Mary, the tears of Mary and humanity, harmonize. From that moment of cross and glory, Mary lives the same feelings as Christ. She is the Mother who became pain for us on the Cross.
Conclusion
Contemplating Mary’s pain is not stopping at an emotional episode in the history of salvation, but entering the point where redemption reveals its human density and, at the same time, its supernatural reach. At the foot of the Cross, Mary’s motherhood reaches its highest form: not only motherhood according to the flesh, but motherhood according to the Father’s design, manifested in the gift of the Son to the disciple and the disciple to Mary (Jn 19:25-27). In that instant, Mary’s participation in the sacrifice of Calvary becomes her permanent mission: to generate, in the order of grace, those who are associated with Christ. The Cross is the end of the Son’s earthly mission, but it is also the beginning of Mary’s maternal mission for the Church.
Therefore, Christian tradition, from the Fathers to the maturation of devotional forms in the West, recognized in the Most Holy Virgin of Sorrows not a lateral devotion, but a path of spiritual understanding of the paschal mystery. “Desolated” is not merely a poetic title: it expresses the real solitude of one who remains when all flee, the strength of the faithful Mother, and the compassion that participates in the suffering of the Redeemer without replacing Him. The pain offered in union with Christ is not merely a narrative of losses, but becomes an act, an interior oblation, a loving consent. Thus, Mary’s silent presence at the Cross constitutes the apex of her association with the salvatory mission, and therefore a living source of her bond with the Church.The spirituality of the Immaculate Heart, as it emerges from the ecclesial consciousness, reveals that Mary’s maternal love is not merely tenderness, but wounded love: the “thorns” signify a love that suffers from lack of acceptance, and that asks for reparation not out of resentment, but out of charity. Here, devotion is not a flight from reality, but a heart education: to learn to respond to love with love, and to transform indifference into conversion. For this reason, the promises linked to acts of piety, when understood with sobriety, should be read as spiritual pedagogy: not a magical shortcut, but a path to enter into the dynamics of penance, fidelity, and communion with Christ.In the image of Mary as Servant and Lamb, theology achieves a synthesis of great strength: the Mother, united to the Lamb, participates in the oblation with the consent of love, becoming a figure of the Church bride, called to share the destiny of the crucified and risen Spouse. The New Eve does not repeat an idealized past: she recapitulates, in trial and suffering, the fidelity that opens the path to life. And so, Mary’s pain, far from fixating on herself, opens up to fertility: it generates hope, sustains perseverance, and teaches that salvation does not eliminate the cross, but transfigures it.Finally, Mary’s tears, united with Jesus’ tears, return to the faithful a truth that our time tends to anesthetize: the gravity of sin and the seriousness of conversion. The Sentor of Sorrows does not paralyze us, but awakens conscience, reopens the contrite heart, and leads to light. “Through the Cross to the Light”: not as a rhetorical motto, but as a concrete form of the Christian path. Devotion to the “Sorrowful Mother,” when lived in the Church and oriented towards the pascal center, becomes a school of mercy, solidarity with the suffering, and fidelity to the saving love. Thus, all the world’s pain, passed through the Mother’s prayer, can become a place of encounter with Christ, where the Cross opens to the dawn of the Resurrection.Also read: The disciple’s path passes through the Cross, Mary at the Foot of the Cross, andMary in Christ reconciles us with God. To deepen your devotion to Mary the Sorrowful, consult the encyclical Redemptoris Mater §18: Mary at the Cross.
Mary’s sorrow at the Cross (John 19:25) is one of the deepest realities of Mariology. It is not passive suffering: Mary, the “Strong Woman” of Scripture (Proverbs 31), stands (stabat), a posture of courage and offering, not of despair. Her sorrow is co-redemptive in the sense that it is conscious, free, and united to the offering of the Son. Simeon had prophesied: “A sword shall pierce through your own soul” (Luke 2:35). On the Cross, this prophecy is fulfilled: Mary’s sorrow is the maternal face of loving salvation.
The Seven Sorrows (or Seven Dolors) of Mary are moments of suffering contemplated in the Marian tradition: 1) The prophecy of Simeon (Luke 2:35); 2) The Flight to Egypt (Matthew 2:13); 3) The Lost Child in Jerusalem (Luke 2:45); 4) Mary’s encounter with Jesus on the Way to Calvary; 5) The Crucifixion and Death of Jesus; 6) The Descent from the Cross (Pietà); 7) Jesus’ Burial. Celebrated on September 15th (Our Lady of Sorrows), these moments propose a spiritual journey that joins human sorrow to Christ’s redemptive mystery through Mary.
Mary is the Mater Dolorosa that the Church invokes precisely because her suffering is human and real: she was not spared pain, she did not receive a spiritual anesthesia. By contemplating her suffering, the faithful learn that suffering does not contradict faith, on the contrary, it can become the place of a deeper encounter with God. Pope John Paul II, in Salvifici Doloris (nos. 25-26), states that Mary “opened her suffering to Christ” and, by doing so, shows the Church how to transform all human suffering into participation in the redemptive mystery of the Son.
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