Mary Magdalene, Model Christian

We speak casually sometimes about the Passion of Jesus. Every year, Lent comes around, followed by the Triduum and Easter. We hear the Gospel readings, stand and take the part of the people calling for Christ's death, kiss the Crucifix, etc. etc., etc. - it's routine. Right?

Except that Good Friday was the most shattering, tragic, astounding day in the cosmos - because the Creator was slain by His creation.

You get some sense of this in The Lance, Louis De Wohl's classic novel about the life and death of Jesus. Mary Magdalene, one of the witnesses to the Crucifixion, speaks quietly to Naomi, the woman caught in adultery (though she is never named in the Gospel), explaining why she covered her face when the Lord was put on the Cross:

[Mary Magdalene says,] "You were not strong enough, little one-"

"But His mother saw it all-"

"No woman can dare compare herself with her, Naomi. There is no woman like her in the world and never has been from the days of Eve. Do you know what you witnessed?"

"The saddest day-"

"Yes, and the most glorious..."

Saint Mary Magdalene saw the Passion and death of Jesus, loving her Savior every step of the way, mourning His suffering, having compassion on Him. There are few better models for those seeking to console the Heart of Jesus. She was also a witness to His resurrection, being among the women to go to the tomb, speak with the angels, and bring word to the Apostles that Christ was buried there no more. She mistook the risen Jesus for a gardener, asking Him where His own body had been laid, and He commissioned her to share the Good News:

Go to my brothers and tell them, "I am going to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God." - Jn 20:17

She who loved the Lord is now sent to bear witness to what she has seen and Whom she has loved. Let us ask her intercession to aid us to do likewise: to love the Lord Jesus who loves us so much; to love and honor His mother in imitation of the perfect Son; and to tell all the world, all our human brethren, that Jesus has gone to His Father and our Father, to His God and our God, and that we are redeemed.

NTBBK

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