Dear brothers and sisters in
Christ
Today, I would like to share
on a devotion that contains one of my favourite prayers. Although I did not
fully understand the purpose of this devotion then, I took to it because of the
meaningful prayer. This devotion relates specially to Christ’s passion and
death, two of the central elements of our faith. It is the Rosary of the Seven
Sorrows of Our Lady.
In this devotion to Our Lady
of Sorrows, we meditate on the seven sorrows of Mary while praying one Our
Father and seven Hail Mary’s for each sorrow. At the end of each cycle, we
pray, “My Mother, share thy grief with me; let me bear thee company, to mourn
thy Jesus’ death with thee.” This sums up the devotion’s purpose, that is, to share
in Mary’s sorrows and unite ourselves with the Passion of Christ and His holy
Mother. Thus, we are led to enter into Jesus’ Heart and honour Him, more so
because we have honoured His Mother by revering her sorrows.
As written by Scott P.
Richert (About.com Catholicism, n.d.), by
uniting ourselves to Mary in her sorrow, we hope to one day also share her joy
in the triumph of her Son. Accordingly,
the Church celebrates the Feast of Our Lady of Sorrows on 15 September, one day
after the Feast of the Triumph of the Cross.
The Seven Sorrows of Mary
are events in Jesus’ life, taken from the Scriptures. They are:
1)
The prophecy of Simeon
2)
The flight into Egypt
3)
The Child Jesus lost in the Temple
4)
Mary meets Jesus carrying the cross
5)
Mary at the foot of the cross
6)
Mary receives the body of Jesus
7)
The burial of Christ
As Fr. William Saunders (Arlington Catholic Herald, 10 October 2000) wrote,
the key image is our Blessed Mother standing faithfully at the foot of the
cross with her dying Son, as recorded in St. John’s Gospel. The Lumen Gentium document
wrote: ”… She stood in keeping with the
divine plan, suffering grievously with her only-begotten Son. There she united
herself, with a maternal heart, to His sacrifice, and lovingly consented to the
immolation of this Victim which she herself had brought forth” (#58). Through
her sufferings with Christ, she plays a part in our redemption.
The Calvary event is also seen as Mary’s
spiritual martyrdom. Fr. Saunders cited St. Bernard thus, “Truly, O Blessed
Mother, a sword has pierced your heart.... He died in body through a love
greater than anyone had known. She died in spirit through a love unlike any
other since His” (De duodecim
praerogatativs BVM).
Indeed, throughout the
centuries, Our Lady has shown her love for us, her children, given by Christ at
the foot of the Cross, by her visitations to us. Twenty centuries after Christ’s
resurrection, Our Lady still weeps in sorrow, at her apparitions at La Salette,
Akita, and Kibeho, among others. Why? At Kibeho, Rwanda, in her most recent and
famous apparitions as Our Lady of Sorrows, she told us why.
“The world conducts itself
very badly.” “The world hastens to its ruin, it will fall into the abyss.” The
Mother of God was very saddened by people’s unbelief and lack of repentance.
She complained of our bad way of life. “Faith and unbelief will come unseen”,
referring to apostasies.
In her urgent appeal for
repentance, she exhorted us, “Convert while there is still time.”
“No one will reach heaven
without suffering.” Suffering helps us compensate for the sins of the world and
participate in Jesus’ and Mary’s sufferings for the world’s salvation.
“Pray always and
single-heartedly”. Mary begs us to pray with greater zeal and purity of heart.
Marian devotion should be
expressed through sincere and regular praying of the Rosary.
She asks for the Rosary of
the Seven Sorrows of the Mother of God to be renewed and spread in the Church,
but not replacing the Holy Rosary.
She asks to pray always for
the Church, when many troubles are upon it in the times to come. Her messages
are for the whole world, for all times.
Upon reflexion, the call for
repentance, while there is still time, applies to all of us, who face our own
inevitable deaths. Indeed, there is a prayer in preparation for death, in the
devotion; it is the one that caught my fancy.
In this Year of Faith, let
us with greater zeal pray for conversion and daily prepare ourselves for our
inevitable deaths. Only then would we progress into our heavenly Father’s
kingdom. Our Lady of Sorrows, intercede for us. Amen.
