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Our Lady of Sorrows

A single candle stands beside the processional cross today, a reminder of Mary's steadfastness beside her Son. It can lead to quite a lot of heart-searching, for most of us are aware that we are much less dependable than she, despite all our good intentions. Perhaps it is those very good intentions that sometimes make us so unreliable. As St Paul remarks, we want to do what is right but perversely end up doing the very thing we don't want to do. The experience can be crushing so we end up deciding not to try at all. That is doing the devil's work for him! Let's look again at that solitary candle. The flame flickers: it wouldn't take much to extinguish it; but it goes on burning and it illumines a surprisingly large area around itself, especially when the shadows lengthen. It won't do to press the analogy too far, but we can take it as an encouragement. Trying to live with integrity, being faithful to prayer and to the Gospel, doing what we can to be of service to those around us and fulfilling the duties of every day may not sound very heroic, but it does require heroism of a kind. Mary stood beside her dying Son because she had watched over him every moment of his life. That daily fidelity enabled her to go on being faithful when fear might have constrained her to act otherwise. We are called to the same kind of constancy, innnumerable little acts of heroism that might, just might, one day make us holy. Scroll down to comment and please be patient while the comment box loads. You can edit the "Guest" tag to use your own name or nickname.