Yesterday we celebrated the Triumph of the Cross. Today the Church invites us to do something that seems almost unnatural: to look away from the Crucified for a moment, and to look at the woman standing next to Him. We call her today Our Lady of Sorrows, Mater Dolorosa.
If the Cross is the throne, she is the queen standing at its foot. If the Cross is the altar of sacrifice, she is the first witness.
The Gospel we just heard gives us few words from Mary on this day. John says: she was *standing*.
In Greek, the verb is *histēmi* – to stand firm, to endure, to remain. She did not collapse. She did not run away. She stood.
This is the heart of today’s feast.
### 1. Sorrow is not the opposite of faith. It is part of it.
We often think of faith as something that takes away sorrow. If I believe enough, I won’t hurt. But Mary shows us the opposite.
We contemplate today her Seven Sorrows:
1. The Prophecy of Simeon – “a sword will pierce your own soul too” (Lk 2:35)
2. The Flight into Egypt
3. The Loss of the Child Jesus in the Temple
4. Meeting Jesus on the Way to Calvary
5. Standing at the Foot of the Cross
6. Receiving Jesus’ body into her arms
7. The Burial of Jesus
Notice what they have in common: every one is about her love for her Son. Her sorrow is not meaningless pain. It is love that hurts. The more you love, the more you can be wounded.
Simeon told her a sword would pierce her heart. Not because God wanted to punish her, but because her heart was so open, so wide, that it could be pierced all the way through. A closed heart cannot be pierced. A small heart feels a small wound. A great heart, like Mary’s, feels a great wound.
Many of you here know this sword. You have stood at the bedside of a child, a spouse, a parent, and you could do nothing but stand. You have received the phone call, the diagnosis, the news you never wanted to hear. In that moment you learned what Mary knew: love does not protect us from sorrow. Love makes us present *in* sorrow.
### 2. She teaches us how to stand.
The world tells us what to do with sorrow: explain it away, distract ourselves from it, become bitter because of it, or deny it.
Mary does none of those things.
She does not explain the Cross. She does not understand it fully in that moment. She ponders it.
She does not run to busy herself. She stands.
She does not become bitter. The last words her Son speaks to her are, “Woman, behold your son” – giving her John, and in John, giving her all of us. Even in her deepest pain, she becomes a mother again.
This is what it means to be co-redemptrix, not that she redeems us- only Christ does that – but that she co-operates. She says *yes* again at the Cross, just as she said *yes* at Nazareth. At Nazareth, it was a yes to joy: “Let it be done to me.” At Calvary, it is a yes to sorrow: “Let it be done to me still.”
And because she stood there, sorrow itself is changed. The Cross is no longer a place where we are alone. There is a mother there.
When you are at your own cross – and each of you has one, even if you hide it well – you are not alone. The Mater Dolorosa has stood there first.
### 3. Her tears lead us to hope.
We call her today “Our Lady of Sorrows,” but we should not leave her there on Good Friday. On Easter Sunday, where is she? The Scriptures are silent, but Tradition is not. Who would the Risen Jesus appear to first, if not His mother?
Her sorrow was not the end of her story, and your sorrow will not be the end of yours.
#The beautiful medieval hymn we sometimes sing today, the *Stabat Mater* – “At the Cross her station keeping, stood the mournful Mother weeping” – ends not with weeping, but with paradise:
“When my body dies, grant that to my soul is given, the glory of paradise.”
Mary teaches us that tears are a prayer. Pope Francis once said that in the most difficult moments, Mary doesn’t take our sorrows away; she accompanies us. She weeps with us so that we do not weep alone.
So what do we take home today?
Don’t be afraid of your own pierced heart. Bring it to her. The devotion of Our Lady of Sorrows is not morbid. It is for real people, living real lives, who have experienced real pain.
This week, when that wave of worry, grief, or old wound comes – do not push it away. Stand with it for a moment, as she stands. Say, “Mother, you know this. Stand with me. Teach me how to stand.”
# Because the woman who stood by the Cross also stands by your cross. And she is standing still – waiting to bring you, as she brought Christ, through sorrow into joy.
**Amen.**
