As the summer slips into fall, we are experiencing more and more moments of uncertainty and fear. What will the rest of this year bring? To be honest, right now, we might feel afraid. The world is an uncertain place. We worry about the safety of those we love. And our emotions? Mine are on a roller coaster. I struggle with Temporal Lobe Epilepsy, and that means that even in the best of times I experience radical emotional ups and downs—so you can imagine what I’m feeling now!

It’s not just me, though. Everyone knows what it’s like when we can’t seem to fit what’s happening in our lives into the previous plan we had for ourselves and others.

But with this new month, Our Lord is offering us comfort in the midst of our distress: he is putting our beings, our lives, our worries, everything into the loving arms of his Mother. September brings us beautiful Marian feasts, some of which aren’t very well-known. For instance, this past Tuesday we celebrated Mary, Mother of the Good Shepherd. On September 8^th we’ll celebrate the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary. On September 15^th we mark the feast of Our Lady of Sorrows. There are other Marian celebrations in these early days of September, including the Feast of the Most Holy Name of the Blessed Virgin Mary on September 12^th, and Marian titles that are celebrated locally in cathedrals, monasteries, and cities, such as Our Lady of the Woods in Galloro (September 5^th), and Our Lady of Good News in Sicily (September 16^th).

Think about how a mother protects her child, soothes its brow, distracts it with songs of maternal love, enfolds it in caring. Our Mother will enfold us, all of us, in her special caring. Just as children run to their mothers to kiss their “boo-boos” away, so can we run to our Mother and pour out our fears, our pain, our distress. She will listen. She will care. We are her own beloved children and she will not turn us away.

The Feast of Mary’s Nativity and the Feast of Our Lady of Sorrows are two twin celebrations that can bring comfort to us in these September days. Traditionally the seven sorrows of Mary are these:

1. The prophecy of Simeon
2. The flight into Egypt
3. The loss of the Child Jesus in the temple
4. The meeting of Jesus and Mary on the Way of the Cross
5. The crucifixion
6. The taking down of the Body of Jesus from the Cross
7. The burial of Jesus

Each of these was a moment when Mary had to let go of her plans or any ideas she may have had of what she thought should be happening.  

Our “sorrows”—and there are many of them in these months of the pandemic and racial unrest—are similar. We think we know who we are and what God is asking us to do and we do our best to make that happen. And at the very moment when we feel sure, secure, pleased with ourselves, the plans break down, sometimes mercifully so.

Sometimes we may feel that when things are falling apart that we are falling apart, that our life is falling apart. But the call that God had given to Mary at her nativity, the joy of heaven at the birth of the one who would be the Mother of God, endured through the sorrows she bore in her life.

Our sorrows don’t change who we are.

They may be a moment of transition and transformation. We may grieve our loss and mourn through periods of desert journeying, but our sorrows do not negate the dream God had for us as we came forth from his creative Love, a dream he is bringing about in us even now. That is something important to remember.

From the celebration of Mary’s Nativity, we can remember that at our birth also  God’s pristine plans for our good and his delight are imprinted in our destiny. Again and again, we have to remind ourselves to let our plans go in order to let the eternally desired destiny willed by God for us to unfold.

Marian feast days come from a long and venerable tradition within the Church of honoring the Virgin Mary in her different ways of being with God, with Jesus, and with the world. Her love extends to all of us in all our ways.

If you are wondering what your life is meant to be—or that of someone else you care about—if carefully laid plans or self-images are falling apart, look back to the moment of creation and birth. The Trinity sang a song over you, has a plan for you, desired you, delights in you even now and will forever. The breaking apart of all we think should be is often the divine path back to the source of our own beauty, call, and happiness.

Holy Mary, help those in need.
Give strength to the weak,
comfort the sorrowful,
pray for God’s people.
May all who seek your help
experience your unfailing protection.
Amen.