Word to the Wise
Thursday, September 15, 2011 - Sept. 15 - Our Lady of Sorrows
[Heb 5:7-9; [opt. Sequence: Stabat Mater]; John 19:25-27 or Luke 2:33-35,1262]When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple there whom he loved he said to his mother, "Woman, behold, you son." Then he said to the disciple, "Behold, your mother." And from that hour the disciple took her into his home. [John] Behold, this child is destined for the fall and rise of many in Israel, and to be a sign that will be contradicted and you yourself a sword will pierce so that the thoughts of many hearts may be revealed. [Luke]
The feast of Our Lady of Sorrows, like so many Marian feasts, offers an opportunity for Catholic devotional imagination or meditation! There are several levels on which one might dwell. First of all there is the particular suffering of this particular woman, Mary. In the scene from the Gospel of John, she is a widow and is seeing the one male figure on which her life depended about to die - her whole world is about to collapse! This is the scene beloved of art and music - the Stabat Mater. In the scene from the Gospel of Luke, she is given an ominous prediction by the old prophet in the temple, which comes on top of all the surprise and dread that accompanied the birth of her son.
A second level concerns the placing of this feast next to the feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross. This can lead one into the world of redemptive suffering - joining one's own suffering to that of Jesus on the cross for the sake of others. A further development of this idea brings forth the world-wide suffering of women for their children, as the graphic photos of the current famine in Somalia that appear almost daily in the news media.
Last, but not least (nor am I claiming to exhaust all the possibilities) there is the "Marian" side of the church which calls forth the maternal/feminine response to suffering, which should characterize disciples of Jesus. The church is still struggling to develop this in greater dimensions because the Petrine and Pauline sides have been so dominant for so long.
Suffering is not a pleasant subject to dwell on, but the feasts of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross and Our Lady of Sorrows bring us face to face with a reality we all share. We suffer and God (and the Mother of God) suffered and continue to suffer for us. AMEN