St. Mary Magdalene

St. Mary Magdalene

By Fr. Conor Donnelly

(Proofread)

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

My Lord and my God, I firmly believe that you are here, that you see me, that you hear me. I adore you with profound reverence. I ask your pardon for my sins and grace to make this time of prayer fruitful. My Immaculate Mother, Saint Joseph, my father and lord, my guardian angel, intercede for me.

“One of the Pharisees invited him to a meal. When he arrived at the Pharisee's house and took his place at the table, suddenly a woman came in, who had a bad name in the town. She had heard he was dining with the Pharisee and had brought with her an alabaster jar of ointment.

“She waited behind him at his feet, weeping, and her tears fell on his feet, and she wiped them away with her hair; then she covered his feet with kisses and anointed them with the ointment.

“When the Pharisee who had invited him saw this, he said to himself, ‘If this man were a prophet, he would know who this woman is, and what sort of person it is who is touching him, and what a bad name she has.’ Then Jesus took him up and said, ‘Simon, I have something to say to you.’ He replied, ‘Say on, Master.’

“‘There was once a creditor who had two men in his debt. One owed him five hundred denarii, the other fifty. They were unable to pay, so he let them both off. Which of them will love him more?’

“Simon answered, ‘The one who has let off more, I suppose.’ Jesus replied, ‘You are right.’

“Then he turned to the woman and said to Simon, ‘You see this woman? I came into your house, and you poured no water on my feet, but she has poured out her tears over my feet and wiped them away with her hair.

“‘You gave me no kiss, but she has been covering my feet with kisses ever since I came in. You did not anoint my head with oil, but she has anointed my feet with ointment. For this reason, I tell you that her sins, many as they are, have been forgiven her, because she has shown such great love. It is someone who is forgiven little who shows little love.’

“Then he said to her, ‘Your sins are forgiven.’

“Those who were at table with him began to say to themselves, ‘Who is this man, that even forgives sins?’’ But he said to the woman, ‘Your faith has saved you; go in peace’” (Luke 7:36-50).

Today is the feast of St. Mary Magdalene, the woman who knew how to love. She had sinned much, and she realizes her sin, and so she comes to love much.

We are also going to be told how on Easter Sunday morning, Mary Magdalene was the first to move. St. John opens the story of the Resurrection with Mary Magdalene, the sinner of the city who knew how to love (John 20:1-2).

In some ways, she represents the whole of sin for humanity. She represents each one of us.

Pope Francis in the last year or so has wanted to raise the celebration of the memorial of St. Mary Magdalene to the dignity of a liturgical feast; thus, recognizing the importance of her role as “the Apostle of Apostles” (Pope Francis and the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, De Apostolorum Apostola, June 3, 2016).

By making this commemoration a feast, her feast is elevated to the same grade as that of the Apostles. This is no small matter.

He wants to bring the figure of Mary Magdalene into our screen a little bit bigger and louder. He said this decision means that we should “reflect more deeply on the dignity of women, on the new evangelization, and on the greatness of the mystery of divine mercy.

She was the first to witness to the Resurrection. She announced the reality of the Resurrection to the Apostles.

Pope Francis says that Mary Magdalene is an example of an authentic evangelizer. She is an evangelist who announces “the joyful central message of Easter.”

The Holy Father took this decision “precisely in the context of the Jubilee of Mercy”—mercy, which is one of the themes of his whole pontificate—"to signify the importance of this woman, who showed great love for Christ and was much loved by Christ.”

Our Lord said, “Do you see this woman?” (Luke 7:44). You did not give me these basic aspects of human hospitality. Christ was well brought up and well educated by Our Lady and St. Joseph. He knew how to behave. He knew the basic details of common hospitality.

“You poured no water on my feet, but she has poured out her tears over my feet and wiped them away with her hair. You gave me no kiss, but she has been covering my feet with kisses ever since I came in. You did not anoint my head with oil, but she has anointed my feet with ointment” (Luke 7:44-47).

Simon who thinks himself high and mighty, full of Pharisaical hypocrisy, misses the point, misses true hospitality, whereas Mary Magdalene pours out the hospitality of the heart.

In this parable, we are invited to always extend that hospitality of the heart to Our Lord Jesus Christ who comes into our soul in Holy Communion, comes onto our altar, stays in our tabernacles.

The example of Mary Magdalene emphasizes the importance of treating Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament well, of treating Him with love.

“For this reason, I tell you that her sins, many as they are, have been forgiven her” (Luke 7:47).

On another occasion, Our Lord was saying to the Pharisees, “The tax collectors and the harlots will enter the kingdom of heaven before you” (Matt. 21:31). Interesting words.

We can ask Mary Magdalene that we might learn how to love Our Lord Jesus Christ like she loved Him and to show it with our deeds, so that we're always beginning again in love.

There was a lawyer in Sydney many years ago who told a story about how a couple came to see him. He was 86 and she was 83.

The lawyer said to them: ‘What can I do for you?’ They said, ‘We want to get a divorce.’

‘Why do you want to get a divorce?’ ‘Because we don't love each other anymore.’

‘How long have you been married?’ ‘Forty years.’

This lawyer used to attend the yearly retreats and recollections and other means of formation. He tried quickly to recall the last meditation that he'd heard on the virtue of charity, and he gave them an impromptu talk on charity.

“Charity is kind; it's patient” (1 Cor. 13:4). It's letting the water flow into the bridge. It's forgiving. It's overlooking the little details. It's not making a mountain out of a molehill, and all the other points he could remember.

He asked them to go away and think about this for a while. They weren't very convinced, but the husband said, ‘Okay, we'll give it a try.’

Three years later, the wife came back to thank the lawyer ‘because,’ she said, ‘my husband just passed away. But I want to thank you, because we've just had three of the most wonderful years of our whole life.’

The moral of the story is that we're always beginning again in love. Love is a mystery. We never fully grasp the mystery, but we can get different optical angles on the mystery from time to time, and enter into that mystery in deeper ways.

Mary Magdalene is an example for us on how to begin again. The Holy Father says, “It is right that the Church’s celebration of this woman is the same great feast given to the celebration of the apostles.”

It shines a light on “the special mission of this woman, as an example and model to every woman in the Church.”

We see Mary Magdalene as the first evangelist. We have great reverence for her. She was the first one to witness the Lord's Resurrection. She was greatly loved by Christ. St. Gregory says she was a “witness of divine mercy.”

In the Preface of St. Mary Magdalene, it says: “Lord, Holy Father, Almighty and Eternal God, whose mercy is no less than his power to preach the gospel to everyone through Christ Our Lord.

“In the garden, he appeared to Mary Magdalene, who had loved him in life, who witnessed his death on the cross, who sought him out as he lay in the tomb, who was the first to adore him when he rose from the dead, and whose apostolic duty was honored by the apostles, so that the good news of new life might reach the ends of the earth.”

John Paul II in Mulieris dignitatem–“The Dignity of a Woman” paid great attention not only to the importance of women in the mission of Christ and the Church, but also gave special emphasis on the particular role of Mary Magdalene, as the first witness who saw the Risen Christ, and the first messenger who announced the Lord's Resurrection to the apostles.

All of this is very relevant for “the new evangelization—which seeks,” he said, “to welcome all men and women of every race, people, language, and nation, without any distinction, to announce to them the Good News of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, while accompanying them on their earthly pilgrimage and offering them the wonders of God's salvation.”

We could think of our witness to the world in relation to the Good News of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, in relation to the family, in relation to the sacredness of every human life, and in relation to the vocation of each man and woman—to be a man or a woman.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church says we have a vocation to be a man or a woman (Catechism, Point 369).

We have been chosen, just like Mary Magdalene was chosen for this mission of evangelization.

St. Anselm of Canterbury says of St. Mary Magdalene that she was “chosen because you are beloved and beloved because you are chosen by God” (St. Anselm, A Prayer to St. Mary Magdalene).

The woman who anoints Christ's feet with perfume, according to a strong ecclesial tradition especially since the time of Gregory the Great, has been identified as Mary Magdalene.

She did this in the house of Simon the Pharisee. She enters there.

The custom of the time was that a wealthy person welcomed his guest to his table. He first called a servant to wash his feet, dusty from the road. Then he kissed Him and poured on his head a few drops of scented oil.

The banquet might also have been public. Anyone could come and observe it. But normally it was the prerogative of men to do this.

But on this occasion, unexpectedly, a woman enters, and she was known as sinful. She threw herself at the Lord's feet, shedding tears and perfume. Our Lord allowed her to do so.

Then He turned to the landlord, Simon, whose thoughts He had guessed and read: ‘If this man were a prophet, he would know what kind of woman this is, but not allow her to touch him.’

Simon is full of judgments, criticisms, not just of Mary, but also of Jesus. Our Lord addresses to him the story of the debtor, and he answers rightly: “The one who has been forgiven most will love most.”

Simon was able to give the right answer to Christ, but ultimately, he was only attracted to Christ by curiosity. The unnamed sinner, the sinner of the city, is unnamed because she represents all of us.

She wasn't attracted by curiosity. She was attracted by the look of mercy and the words that flowed from the heart of Jesus, which illumined her mind and warmed her heart.

Christ gives her the peace, the goodness, and the joy she was looking for. She wept first for the pain of her sins and then for the joy of forgiveness.

Each of us is called to walk along the pathway of Mary Magdalene, to go close to the Sacred Humanity of Christ, and to find there our peace, our goodness, and our joy.

The tears of this woman were like the waters of Baptism in which the sinner died, and the new creature was born.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church says that with divine grace in our soul, we become a new creation. She showed her pain to Christ and He confirmed her in her love. Love is born from forgiveness and forgiveness makes love grow.

This encounter with Christ shocked the life of Mary Magdalene. The same thing can happen to us if we also present our pain to Jesus.

We know that when Mary Magdalene fell in love with Jesus, she never left Him. She was there at the foot of the Cross.

That love moves her on Easter Sunday morning to get up early and go to the tomb because she can't sleep. Her love leads her to suffer the pain of loss, and she goes looking for the Master.

She's the first to see the empty tomb and to hear the truth about the Resurrection.

“He is not here; he has risen, as he said” (Matt. 28:6). St. Anselm says that in the garden Mary sheds tears of humility–lacrimas humilitatis. She's a bit lost. She's crestfallen, a person not easily given to optimism or excitement.

She doesn't yet fully understand the Resurrection. She doesn't recognize Jesus initially when He appears to her.

Gregory the Great says: “Indeed because a woman offered death to a man in paradise, a woman announces life to the men from the tomb (St. Gregory, XL homiliarium in Evangelia)).

The Lord says to Mary, “Do not cling to me–noli me tangere” (John 20:17). “It is an invitation…to enter an experience of faith that goes beyond the materialistic and the human grasping of the divine mystery, which is not simply addressed to Mary but to the entire Church. It's an ecclesial moment! It is a lesson for every follower of Christ not to seek human securities nor the vainglory of this world, but in faith, to seek the Living and Risen Christ” (Pope Francis and the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, De Apostolorum Apostola, June 3, 2016).

Our Lord says to her, “‘Go to my brethren and say to them, I am ascending to my Father and to your Father, to my God and to your God. Mary goes and she announces to the apostles: ‘I have seen the Lord!’ And she told them that he had said these things to her” (John 20:17-18).

If we follow the story of Mary Magdalene, we find it's a very rich story. She plays a very important role.

It's significant that at this point in history, Pope Francis has turned our attention to this Apostle of the Apostles, in highlighting also the Divine Mercy.

“From the beginning of Christ's mission,” says John Paul II, “women show to him and to his mystery a special sensitivity which is characteristic of their femininity. … This is…confirmed…not only at the Cross, but also at the dawn of the Resurrection.

“The women are the first at the tomb…the first to find it empty…the first to hear: ‘He is not here. He has risen, as he said’ (Matt. 28:6). They are the first to embrace his feet (cf. Matt. 28:9)…the first to be called to announce this truth to the Apostles” (cf. Matt. 28:1-10, Luke 24:8-11) (John Paul II, Apostolic Letter, Mulieris Dignitatem, August 15, 1988).

It is in the Gospel of John that the special role of Mary Magdalene is emphasized. She thinks initially that Our Lord is the gardener. She recognizes Him only when He calls her by her name, and she turns and says: Rabboni. Our Lord addresses her by her own name, Mary (John 20:16-18).

It's very personal, very individualistic. It's a reminder to us that Our Lord is there around us, very close, even though we don't recognize Him.

It's a special moment. When Christ entrusts this divine truth of His Resurrection to this particular person, and all men through her.

There's a link-up here with a phrase from the Old Testament that says, “I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh. Your sons and your daughters shall prophesy” (Joel 2:28). These words are fulfilled.

“The fact of being a man or a woman involves no limitation, just as the salvific and sanctifying action of the Spirit in man is in no way limited by the fact that one is a Jew or a Greek, slave or free. … St. Paul says, ‘For you are all one in Christ Jesus’” (Gal. 3:28).

We can't overstate the power of divine mercy. God's mercy is relentless and reaches out to every sinner. This is a reminder to us that we have to carry out the apostolate of Confession in all places, in all moments, with all people.

Jesus embodies the love of God, which crosses barriers, overcomes all the boundaries that we may set for it. “The glory of God is man fully alive” (St. Irenaeus, Against Heresies).

Divine mercy is divinizing. And that divine mercy summons us to a mission.

The sinner of the city, although she knew that she could not get close to Jesus, she therefore, says St. Augustine, did not go near to the head, but to the feet.

Whenever feet are mentioned in Scripture, something very important is taking place. The leper who was cleansed, one of the ten, came back and fell at the feet of Jesus (Luke 17:11-19). It's a profound act of thanksgiving.

Jesus washed the feet of the apostles (John 13:1-17). Mary Magdalene also bathes the feet of Jesus. She who had long followed the path of vice was trying to follow in the footsteps marked by the holy feet of Christ.

St. Augustine says, “She began to shed tears, which are like the blood of the heart, and then washed the feet of the Lord with the humble confession of her sins (St. Augustine, Sermon 49).

Her faith is the path that has led her to that piece of land at the feet of Jesus, as to at the Baptismal font, with the hope that the impossible could become a new life.

All of this drives her to kneel before him. She touches for love. She touches Him to hand Him her sin. She knows she's a sinner. Simon doesn't fully realize that he is a sinner.

‘What kind of woman is this who is touching Him?’ She knows her absolute unworthiness. Her sins are there, obvious in her hands.

True hospitality is not the one that was offered by Simon, but the one given by the sinner, and therefore by all of us. It was the hospitality of the heart, born of love. It's not an external behavior of fact, but a fact done by inner choices, dictated by love.

Simon's words opened only formally and externally the door of his house to the Savior, while Mary Magdalene opened the door of her heart.

We're invited to go closer to Our Lord, to open our hearts to Him. The public life of this sinful woman changed, because she knelt at the feet of Jesus, experiencing the forgiveness and the peace in which to walk in the newness of life.

And that path of liberation was not only to follow in going from bad to good, but to persevere all the way to the feet of Christ on the Cross and in the garden where the tomb was located, and where she met the risen Lord, who called her by her name.

The Pharisee stops in the doorway of a true relationship and communion and remains imprisoned in the claim of the pretension of justice, of a man who considers himself a good person. He believes himself without sin, and so no tear follows his face.

He judges, relying on his knowledge of the Scriptures, guided only by his own criteria. Those based on rules and commandments of men that have the pretension of correcting those of God.

He's full of pride. Simon has the gift of sitting at the table with Him, but it's a formal presentation of an attitude of superiority and sufficiency that makes him forget the elementary rules of welcoming.

He believes to fulfill the law and the precepts, but leaves out the essential, which is the acceptance of the guest, the rights that any Jew used to perform. He didn't have even simple attention, even the slightest care.

St. Josemaría in the Furrow says, “Ask Jesus to grant you a Love like a purifying furnace, where your poor flesh—your poor heart—may be consumed and cleansed of all earthly miseries. Pray that it may be emptied of self and filled with him.

“Ask him to grant you a deep-seated aversion to all that is worldly so that you may be sustained only by Love” (Josemaría Escrivá, Furrow, Point 814).

“Invoke the heart of Holy Mary,” he says, “with the purpose and determination of uniting yourself to her sorrow, in reparation for your sins and the sins of men of all times.

“And pray to her—for every soul—that her sorrow may increase in us our aversion to sin, and that we may be able to love the physical and moral contradictions of each day as a means of expiation” (J. Escrivá, Furrow, Point 258).

We could ask Our Lady to help us to use this example of St. Mary Magdalene's feast day, to love the risen Christ a little more, to go to His heart, as Mary of Magdalene went to His heart, and to offer Him the true hospitality of our heart, so that we also flee from all hypocrisy and external manifestations that are lacking in any interior correspondence.

I thank you, my God, for the good resolutions, affections, and inspirations that you have communicated to me during this meditation. I ask your help to put them into practice. My Immaculate Mother, Saint Joseph, my father and lord, my guardian angel, intercede for me.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

OLV