One of history’s most famous women, we all think we know Mary Magdalene, but do we? Penitent prostitute is what typically comes to mind, but where does that narrative come from? The bible you say? Let me guess, you are referring to Luke’s: The Pardon of the Sinful Woman. The age-old story where Jesus dines with a Pharisee. A “sinful woman” enters the scene and bathes his feet with her tears, dries them with her hair, kisses and anoints them with oil. But wait, nowhere is the name Mary Magdalene, or even Mary mentioned. So why do we associate this parable with Mary Magdalene?
Apparently in 591 Pope Gregory the Great mixed three biblical women into one during his homily: Mary Magdalene, Mary of Bethany and the unnamed adulteress. Then medieval poets and philosophers took the idea of the Madonna and the Whore and ran with it. So, what made it stick? Was Mary Magdalene simply a sacrificial lamb for the convert of sexual sinners or were there more misogynistic motives at play?
Ultimately in 1969 The Vatican quietly switched the reading for the feast day of Mary Magdalene from the previously mentioned, The Pardon of the Sinful Woman, to The Appearance to Mary of Magdala.
The Appearance to Mary of Magdala
“But Mary stood outside the tomb weeping. And as she wept, she bent over into the tomb and saw two angels in white sitting there, one at the head and one at the feet where the body of Jesus had been. And they said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you looking for?” She thought it was the gardener and said to him. “Sit if you carried him away, tell me where you laid him, and I will take him.” Jesus said to her, “Mary!” She turned and said to him in Hebrew, “Rabbouni,” which means Teacher. Jesus said to her, “Stop holding on to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father. But go to my brothers and tell them, “I am going to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.” Mary of Magdala went and announced to the disciples, “I have seen the Lord,” and what he told her.”
John 20: 11-18
Even my grandmother’s 1977 Lives of the Saints book states, “However, in the instructions given with the latest edition of the Roman Calendar, the Latin Church has stipulated that the feast is solely that of the woman to whom Christ appeared and not that of the sister of Lazarus or the penitent woman.” (p. 300). Surprisingly though, even some fifty years later, most people are not aware of this.
So, what can we discern as true of Mary Magdalene? She was a disciple of Jesus in Galilee, present at the Crucifixion, among the women who discovered the empty tomb and heard the angelic announcement of the Resurrection of Christ, and most importantly was the first person to see Christ later that day.
To think that a woman so obviously favored by Jesus, was reduced to a common whore for some 1,400 years really makes you question things. I wonder how Mary Magdalene feels about this. I wonder what Jesus thinks! In the end Mary Magdalene may have been mislabeled as a sexual sinner, but she was a trailblazer for women in the church. Jesus viewed women as equals and Mary Magdalene proves that. Clearly, she held her own in a culture dominated by men if Christ chose her of all people to appear to first at His Resurrection. So now that we have the story straight, the possibilities we can achieve with the helpful intercession of Mary Magdalene seem endless. Just as Mary Magdalene joyously shared the news of Jesus’ Resurrection with His disciples, that’s start the conversation to clear her name with our families this East Sunday.