It is carried out by passing from Station to Station, with certain prayers at each and devout meditation on the various incidents in turn. The object of the Stations is to help the faithful to make in spirit, as it were, a pilgrimage to the chief scenes of Christ’s sufferings and death, and this has become one of the most popular of Catholic devotions. They are as follows: (I) Christ condemned to death (2) the cross is laid upon Him (3) His first fall (4) He meets His Blessed Mother (5) Simon of Cyrene is made to bear the cross (6) Christ’s face is wiped by Veronica (7) His second fall (8) He meets the women of Jerusalem (9) His third fall (10) He is stripped of His garments (11) His Crucifixion (12) His death on the cross (13) His body is taken down from the cross and (14) laid in the tomb. Formerly their number varied considerably in different places but fourteen are now prescribed by authority. The erection and use of the Stations did not become at all general before the end of the seventeenth century, but they are now to be found in almost every church. In monasteries they are often placed in the cloisters.
They are usually ranged at intervals around the walls of a church, though sometimes they are to be found in the open air, especially on roads leading to a church or shrine.
Some Stations are valuable works of art, as those, for instance in Antwerp cathedral, which have been much copied elsewhere. Taken in the former sense, the Stations may be of stone, wood, or metal, sculptured or carved, or they may be merely paintings or engravings. These names are used to signify either a series of pictures or tableaux representing certain scenes in the Passion of Christ, each corresponding to a particular incident, or the special form of devotion connected with such representations. Way of the Cross (STATIONS OF THE CROSS, VIA CRUCIS, VIA DOLOROSA).
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