Our Lady of Sorrows

This feast contemplates Mary standing at the foot of the Cross — the moment Simeon's prophecy was fulfilled: "A sword will pierce your own soul too." The tradition of the Seven Sorrows traces her grief from the prophecy in the Temple through the flight into Egypt, the loss of the child Jesus, the Way of the Cross, the Crucifixion, the taking down from the Cross, and the burial.

The memorial falls on September 15, the day after the Exaltation of the Holy Cross, placing the mother's grief beside the instrument of her son's death. It is not a feast of despair but of compassion in the original sense — "suffering with." Mary does not look away from the Cross; she stands.

The devotion reminds the faithful that sorrow is not the opposite of faith but can be its deepest expression. In Mary at Calvary, the Church sees a model for every believer who has stood beside a dying loved one, trusted God in darkness, and refused to let grief become despair.