As I write this piece celebrating Mary Magdalene on her feast day, I keep thinking how beloved she must be to so many of us who write for Wisdom’s Dwelling. I’m pretty sure between us, we could easily pen a book about how truly monumental a figure she is to so many women of faith. Her’s is a story of the depths of human despair and the heights of Jesus’ redemptive power. She she literally helped to transform the human story by letting God transform her first. Her’s is also a story of presence.
Eight years ago, Pope Francis officially named Mary Magdalene “Apostle to the apostles.” What a phrase that is! Apostle, from Greek apostolos, means “person sent.” So Mary Magdalene was the person sent to the people Jesus sent to go into the world on His behalf. She was the one called to minister to the men that Jesus officially designated to “make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit” (Matthew 28:19). And Mary Magdalene’s role was to be to these men what they were called to be to the world. I wish we knew exactly what influence she had on how they carried out their missions. I wish her conversations with them were carefully written down and passed throughout the annals of history. But they weren’t.
The most detailed sentence about her role as an apostle is found in Luke 8:1-3. It describes how Jesus went “through cities and villages, proclaiming and bringing the good news of the kingdom of God. And the twelve were with him, and also some women who had been healed of evil spirits and infirmities: Mary, called Magdalene, from whom seven demons had gone out… and many others, who provided for them out of their means.” So we know that she was tormented by seven(!) demons who Jesus cast out of her, and we know that she traveled with Jesus and his disciples on their evangelical journeys, and that she gave generously of her own money and provisions to support them. But there’s so much we don’t know: What horrors did she endure under the influence of those demons? How did she meet Jesus? What did she learn from Him? What was it like to travel with a band of religious rebels in a hostile Roman environment? As an aside, I do appreciate how the tv series The Chosen tries to fill in the outline of her life and tell her remarkable story in more detail.
Mary Magdalene is also known as the first evangelist. She is the very first person Jesus appeared to after His resurrection and she is the first person He tasks with telling others about it, a mission she immediately fulfills (John 20). It is a truly radical move on Jesus’ part to reveal his risen Divinity and His mission to a woman first, and I personally find His action extremely comforting/healing/inspiring. No matter the wounds some of us have had inflicted from various church experiences, Jesus never subjugated women to second place.
The last thing I want to emphasize about Mary Magdalene is her presence. During all of the events of Jesus’ death and resurrection, Mary Magdalene is there. She remains by the cross after the disciples fled, she followed his body to find his tomb, she bought spices to anoint him, and then she went early in the morning while it was still dark to mourn at his tomb, which is where she was surprised by the resurrected Jesus! In just the few details we do know, Mary Magdalene shows us how to remain loyal and present in our faith through every extreme.
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