Today’s feast focuses on the way Mary shared in the suffering of Jesus her Son. Our Lady of Sorrows is one of her many titles. She is also the Queen of Martyrs because she suffered a new kind of martyrdom. As a mother, Mary witnessed her innocent Son, the one whom she loves with her whole being cruelly tormented and put to death.
According to St. Alphonsus, this was the 5th sword that pierced her heart. When Mary presented the infant Christ in the temple, Simeon prophesied that a “sword will pierce her heart.” Pope John Paul II commented in Redemptoris Mater that this was the 2nd Annunciation. “She will have to live her obedience of faith in suffering at the side of the suffering Savior and that her motherhood will be mysterious and sorrowful.”
“Every torture inflicted on the body of Jesus,” says St. Jerome “was a wound in the heart of Mary”. Under the cross Mary was offering the life of her Son to the Father for our salvation. She was cooperating with Christ for our redemption.
By her sorrow, she was leading us to eternal salvation.
