Our Lady of Sorrows

Private devotion to the Seven Sorrows of the Blessed Virgin preceded the institution of a corresponding liturgical feast by quite some time. This devotion became especially popular from the fifteenth century onward. We need only recall the countless “pietà” images that depict Mary holding on her lap the body of her Son taken down from the Cross. Such images, particularly characteristic of late Gothic and Renaissance art, abound—among them the world-famous Pietà of Michelangelo.

Yet the “pietà” represents only one of Mary’s sorrows. Numbered in different ways, they eventually came to be fixed at seven, corresponding to as many moments from the Gospels that were especially painful for the heart of the Mother of the Redeemer:

Simeon’s prophecy in the Temple.

The flight into Egypt.

The loss of the child Jesus for three days until he was found in the Temple.

The way of the Cross to Calvary.

The crucifixion and Jesus’ farewell from the Cross.

The taking down from the Cross (the “pietà”).

The burial of Jesus.

Tradition later associated each sorrow with a joy of Mary, though the joys never achieved the same popular or liturgical devotion as the sorrows.

By the fifteenth century, some churches had begun to celebrate liturgically Mary’s “Compassion” at the foot of the Cross, a practice that spread above all in central Europe. Generally the feast was celebrated either during Passiontide or after the Easter octave. The Servite Order—whose special mission was to honor and meditate on Mary’s Seven Sorrows, and whose legendary foundation is attributed to seven holy founders (see February 17)—obtained papal approval in 1667 for the feast of the Seven Sorrows. It was later added to the Roman calendar in 1814, under Pope Pius VII, and placed on the third Sunday of September. In 1913, Saint Pius X fixed it permanently on September 15.

From 1727 until 1960, this September feast coexisted with another commemoration of the Seven Sorrows held on the Friday of the first week of Passiontide. The present calendar simplified matters: it reduced the September observance to a memorial and changed the title, no longer specifying “Seven Sorrows,” as if to invite the faithful to contemplate Mary’s suffering in a broader and more general way.

Still, in Spain the devotion remains especially strong—even reflected in names. Many women bear the name “Dolores,” or “María de los Dolores,” in plural, recalling Our Lady’s sorrows.

The devotion to Mary’s sorrows is deeply personal in character, shaping the field of Christian piety. The famous sequence Stabat Mater clearly reveals its origin as a private devotion before it entered the liturgy.