Mary Magdalene

July 22, Thursday

Sixteenth Week in Ordinary Time

 

Contrary to popular belief, which is based on a rather late “tradition” in the West only, Mary Magdalene is not the sinful woman described in Luke 7. We know that she was from Magdala and had been cured by the Lord. She became an eager and loving witness to the Lord’s resurrection.

 

First Reading: Song of Songs 3:1-4a

Restless in bed and sleepless through the night, I longed for my lover. I wanted him desperately. His absence was painful. 

So I got up, went out and roved the city, hunting through streets and down alleys. I wanted my lover in the worst way! I looked high and low, and didn’t find him. 

And then the night watchmen found me as they patrolled the darkened city. “Have you seen my dear lost love?” I asked. 

No sooner had I left them than I found him, found my dear lost love. 

 

Gospel: John 20:1,11-18

Early in the morning on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb and saw that the stone was moved away from the entrance. But Mary stood outside the tomb weeping. As she wept, she knelt to look into the tomb and saw two angels sitting there, dressed in white, one at the head, the other at the foot of where Jesus’ body had been laid. 

They said to her, “Woman, why do you weep?” “They took my Master,” she said, “and I don’t know where they put him.” 

After she said this, she turned away and saw Jesus standing there. But she didn’t recognize him. 

Jesus spoke to her, “Woman, why do you weep? Who are you looking for?” She, thinking that he was the gardener, said, “Mister, if you took him, tell me where you put him so I can care for him.” 

Jesus said, “Mary.” Turning to face him, she said in Hebrew, “Rabboni!” meaning “Teacher!” 

Jesus said, “Don’t cling to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father. Go to my brothers and tell them, ‘I ascend to my Father and your Father, my God and your God.'” 

Mary Magdalene went, telling the news to the disciples: “I saw the Master!” And she told them everything he said to her.

 

Prayer

Lord our God,
Mary Magdalene sought your Son
with the impetuosity of a person
who loved him deeply
and who was afraid to have lost him.
When she had recognized him,
he made her a witness to his resurrection.
Lord God, help us discover
the presence of your Son
in the people around us
and may they recognize
that Jesus Christ lives in us
now and for ever. Amen.

 

Reflection:

Apostle of the Apostles

Today the Church celebrates the feast of the first witness to the Risen Lord – St. Mary Magdalene. She is most remembered for her Easter testimony. She is the only woman disciple of Jesus named by all the four evangelists. Being present at the crucifixion, and at the empty tomb, she was an eyewitness to the ministry, death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus. And she became the first messenger of the resurrection to the other apostles – which earned her the title “Apostle of the Apostles”

In the gospel of John, the first words out of Jesus’ mouth are a question: “What are you looking for?” Essentially everything that Jesus does and teaches in the rest of John’s gospel gives an answer to that question: We are looking for the way, the truth, the life, living water to quench our thirst, bread from heaven to satiate our hunger. But those answers are partially abstract. At the end of the gospel, we have this question repeated and there is the answer:
On Easter Sunday morning, Mary Magdalene goes out to the tomb to anoint the body of Jesus. She, but finds him in a garden (the typical place where lovers meet). But she doesn’t recognize him. Jesus turns to her and, repeating the question with which the gospel began, asks her: “What are you looking for?” Mary replies that she is looking for the body of the dead Jesus and could he give her any information as to where that body is. And Jesus simply says: “Mary”. He pronounces her name in love. She falls at his feet
In essence, that is the whole gospel: What are we ultimately looking for? What is the end of all desires? What drives us out into gardens to search for love? The desire to hear God pronounce our names in love. To hear God lovingly saying our name: Jose!

The following is a poem by renowned theologian Fr. Ron Rolheiser about the encounter of Mary Magdalene and Jesus in the garden.

I never suspected
Resurrection to be so painful… to leave me weeping
With joy to have met you, alive and smiling, outside an empty tomb
With regret, not because I’ve lost you but because I’ve lost you in how I had you — in understandable, touchable, kissable, clingable flesh not as fully Lord, but as graspably human.

I want to cling, despite your protest cling to your body cling to your, and my, clingable humanity cling to what we had, our past.
But I know that…if I cling, you cannot ascend and
I will be left clinging to your former self …unable to receive your present spirit.

[Fr Ronald Rolheiser, Mary Magdala’s Easter Prayer in Forgotten Among the Lillies, p176.]

 

Video available on Youtube: Apostle of the Apostles