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Christ wants us to realise that the worst thing for Him to endure, in the events leading up to His trial, was not the roar of the crowd, but the desertion of His friends, which wounded His heart.

Just as our Saviour, Christ, was pushed towards the man who would pronounce the death sentence on Him, though He had done no wrong, so a beautiful, unborn baby is pushed - inside its mother - along a hospital corridor towards the surgeon who is willing to carry out its execution, though the child has done no wrong.

Just as Christ was left half-dead, after a cruel scourging, and was about to die on the Cross of Calvary, so it frequently happens that an aborted baby is left half-dead on a work-top, unwanted and untended, left to die solely because the child is unwanted. It is a monstrous sin, in God's sight, to kill the innocent.

Christ wants each of us to believe that His love for us is real and everlasting. He was willing to live on earth, and even to be mocked and put to death on the Cross, in order to save each of us from the consequences of sin. Every individual can say: "He went to the Cross, for my sake". We can believe, and respond with gratitude - or, with hard hearts, turn away.

We are sometimes humiliated, slandered or ignored, because of our Christian faith. In His Passion, Christ set us an example. He kept silent, as an example for His friends to follow, as He accepted the Will of the Father, to fulfill the Father's plan of salvation. He had confidence in the Father's love, and the Father's power to save Him.

There are times when we must make protests, for the sake of justice, but in most of our unavoidable sufferings we can look to Jesus in His Passion, for an example. He was mocked and assaulted, but did not respond with curses or self-pity. He trusted in His Heavenly Father, and kept silent. Out of love for us, He was willing to go through death in order to conquer death, and to give us the hope of Eternal Life.

We are sometimes humiliated, slandered or ignored, because of our Christian faith. In His Passion, Christ set us an example. He kept silent, as an example for His friends to follow, as He accepted the Will of the Father, to fulfill the Father's plan of salvation. He had confidence in the Father's love, and the Father's power to save Him.

Christ's own people found it difficult to recognise, in a Person suffering pain and humiliation, the King or warrior they awaited as a Saviour. But in His Resurrection Christ performed a marvel greater than any achieved in a throne-room or a battlefield. Truly, He and God the Father are One, as Christ said.

The Church recommends to her children many devotions, three special ones having been practiced by Saints through the ages; we honour Jesus in His Sacred Passion; we adore Him in the Most Blessed Sacrament; and we honour His Holy Virgin Mother Mary, at whose consent Jesus was made flesh in our world.

Christ wants us all to know how deeply He rejoices in our devotion to 'Our Lady of Sorrows'. It was the Father Who made Mary worthy to be mother of Jesus, gave her the courage to persevere even through her Son's Passion - and so to enjoy His Resurrection.

When Christ was in torment, hanging on the Cross, He suffered mental and spiritual torment too, from the knowledge of all the people who would ignore His message, and would refuse to repent: especially those who would request or carry out abortions. The sight of hundreds of dead babies grieved His tender heart.

Christ saw dreadful sights as He suffered on the Cross. He saw the aborted babies whose lives would be cruelly ended; but even worse for Him was the sight of many 'dead' souls: diseased souls in mortal sin, souls now made foul and repulsive through their own thoughts and actions; so Christ's torment was spiritual and mental, as well as physical, in His Passion.

None of us need fear that God is powerless to help us withstand the assaults of the evil one. Christ on the Cross seemed to be weak; yet He was powerful enough to rise from the dead; and so He is certainly powerful enough to enable us to endure the assaults and temptations that come to us through the evil one. We ought not to live in fear, but rather, to be confident that Christ will keep His promises.

Christ understands what many of the elderly suffer. On the Cross, He suffered not just pain, but also the helplessness, weakness and loss of control that many patients experience who are neglected in hospitals, and who should turn to Him for consolation when they are grieving about the apparently disastrous end to their lives.

None of us can imagine how close Christ is to His holy Mother Mary. He Who created her was later born of her. Her love for Him, and her trust in Him, were perfect. He confided in her. She knew, even before the Apostles did, that Christ would suffer; and so she prayed, and endured, and waited; and she consoled her beloved son by her presence.

Whenever we offer up our sufferings, willingly accepting them in union with Christ in His Passion, we can know that we win graces for the Holy Souls in Purgatory, or for people on earth who are trapped in sin. We enable someone, somewhere, to leave gloom behind and to move towards the light of Heaven. We do their penance, for them.

Since God the Father's plan was that Christ came to us through Mary, bringing His saving graces, He is always the Father's gift - and always through Mary. The gift is never taken back. Hence her title of 'Co-Redemptrix'; though Christ is the only Saviour, who died on the Cross for our sins.

The Lord wants to see His Mother honoured by a formal declaration that she does indeed merit the two titles long-applied to her: 'Co-Redemptrix', and, 'Mediatrix of all Graces'. Only Christ, our Divine Saviour, merited our Salvation by His Passion and Death; but His Immaculate Mother willingly united her sufferings and prayers to His, as she stood beneath the Cross, hence, 'Co-Redemptrix', as she prayed for sinners; and since Christ came to us through her, so He still comes to us, spiritually, through her, hence the second title.

Mary was chosen by God for a special role; and God the Father never changes His mind or revokes His choice. Just as He chose to bring Jesus to us, through the sinless Virgin Mary, so He still wishes to help us, through her. Indeed, He pours out through her, upon us, the graces that her son Jesus Christ won for us by His death on the Cross, as she stood beneath it, uniting her sufferings with His.

Jesus Christ is Divine. He is God-made-man, whereas His mother is only human - though very pure and holy. Christ did not simply use the Virgin Mary as a conduit for His arrival on earth. Her life is inextricably entwined with His, and will be so forever, as she intercedes for the Church, at His side in Heaven. It was by Divine grace that she was conceived Immaculate, worthy to be the mother of the Infant Jesus. She taught Him in His boyhood, then saw Him teach others, in His adult life. She suffered with Him, as He endured the Cross; and after His Resurrection and Ascension she guided the disciples. She was with them at Pentecost. But when her work on earth was done she was assumed, body and soul, to Heaven, to be with her beloved son forever, interceding for us who need their prayers.