Feast of our Lady of Sorrows in Lent

Greater Double (1955 Calendar): Friday before Palm Sunday

Commemoration (1962 Calendar): Friday before Palm Sunday

Today, the Friday after Passion Sunday is dedicated to the honor of the Seven Sorrows of the Blessed Virgin Mary in the Traditional Roman Catholic Calendar.  This day is in addition to the honor given to our Lady and her Seven Sorrows in September's Feast day by this same name.

Dom Gueranger writes in The Liturgical Year:

This Friday of Passion-week is consecrated in a special manner, to the sufferings which the holy Mother of God endured at the foot of the cross. The whole of next week is fully taken up with the celebration of the mysteries of Jesus’ Passion; and although the remembrance of Mary’s share in those sufferings is often brought before the faithful during Holy Week, yet, the thought of what her Son, our divine Redeemer, goes through for our salvation, so absorbs our attention and love, that it is not then possible to honour, as it deserves, the sublime mystery of the Mother’s com-passion.

It was but fitting, therefore, that one day in the year should be set apart for this sacred duty: and what day could be more appropriate than the Friday of this week, which, though sacred to the Passion, admits the celebration of saints’ feasts, as we have already noticed? As far back as the fifteenth century (that is, in the year 1423), we find the pious archbishop of Cologne, Theodoric, prescribing this feast to be kept by his people. It was gradually introduced, and with the knowledge of the holy See, into several other countries; and at length, in the last century, Pope Benedict XIII, by a decree dated August 22, 1727, ordered it to be kept in the whole Church under the name of the Feast of the Seven Dolours of the Blessed Virgin Mary, for, up to this time, it had gone under various names. We will explain the title thus given to it, as also the first origin of the devotion of the Seven Dolours, when our Liturgical Year brings us to the third Sunday of September, the second feast of Mary’s Dolours. What the Church proposes to her children’s devotion for this Friday of Passion-week, is that one special dolour of Mary—her standing at the foot of the cross. Among the various titles given to this feast before it was extended by the holy See to the whole Church, we may mention, Our Lady of Pity, the Compassion of our Lady, and the one that was so popular throughout France, Notre Dame de la Pamoison. These few historical observations prove that this feast was dear to the devotion of the people, even before it received the solemn sanction of the Church.

That we may clearly understand the object of this feast, and spend it, as the Church would have us do, in paying due honour to the Mother of God and of men, we must recall to our minds this great truth: that God, in the designs of His infinite wisdom, has willed that Mary should have a share in the work of the world’s redemption. The mystery of the present feast is one of the applications of this divine law, a law which reveals to us the whole magnificence of God’s plan; it is, also, one of the many realizations of the prophecy, that satan’s pride was to be crushed by a woman. In the work of our redemption there are three interventions of Mary; that is, she was thrice called upon to take part in what God Himself did. The first of these was in the Incarnation of the Word, who would not take flesh in her virginal womb until she had given her consent to become His Mother; and this she gave by that solemn Fiat which blessed the world with a Saviour. The second was in the sacrifice which Jesus consummated on Calvary, where she was present that she might take part in the expiatory offering. The third was on the day of Pentecost, when she received the Holy Ghost, as did the apostles, in order that she might effectively labour in the establishment of the Church. We have already explained, on the feast of the Annunciation, the share Mary had in that wonderful mystery of the Incarnation, which God wrought for His own glory and for man’s redemption and sanctification. On the feast of Pentecost we shall speak of the Church commencing and progressing under the active influence of the Mother of God. To-day we must show what part she took in the mystery of her Son’s Passion; we must tell the sufferings, the Dolours, she endured at the foot of the cross, and the claims she thereby won to our filial gratitude.

Collect:

O God, in Your passion, the prophecy of Simeon was fulfilled that a sword of sorrow should pierce the sweet soul of Your glorious Virgin-Mother Mary. We reverently recall her sufferings and sorrow; mercifully grant us the fruits of the redemption that was paid for by Your own sufferings, through the merits and prayers of all the saints watching beside the cross; who lives and rules with God the Father...