The figure of Saint Mary Magdalene (Mary of Magdala), celebrated every July 22 of the year, is one of the most confused figures in religious history. This confusion mainly comes from merging several characters from the New Testament into a single woman. But today, I would like to invite you to do something unusual. Forget everything you think you know about her, forget the films and the novels, and simply return to the Gospel, because the Gospel tells us extraordinary things about Mary Magdalene. Understanding who Mary Magdalene truly is means understanding something essential about faith, the resurrection, and the way God chooses His witnesses.
In the four Gospels, Mary Magdalene appears at specific, foundational moments. She is present at the cross when almost all the disciples have fled. She is present at the burial, and she is the first—the very first—to whom the risen Christ appears on Easter morning. The Gospel of John recounts it with breathtaking precision. It is to Mary Magdalene that Jesus speaks her name for the first time after the Resurrection. On Easter morning, Mary Magdalene is at the tomb. She is weeping; she is looking for a body; she does not yet understand what has happened. And it is in this state of grief, confusion, and absolute faithfulness that she hears, “Mary.” This moment is one of the most beautiful in the entire Gospel because it tells us something fundamental about the way God reveals Himself. He does not reveal Himself to the powerful, the learned, or those who hold authority. He reveals Himself to the one who remained, to the one who wept, to the one who kept searching even without understanding, to the one who loved. And He entrusts her with the most important mission in all of human history: Go and proclaim that death has been conquered: “Go to my brothers and tell them, I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’” (John 20:17)
Mary Magdalene does not choose this role. She does not claim it. She receives it, and she obeys. This is what the Church celebrates when it calls her the apostle of the apostles. Not an honorary promotion, but a recognition of what Christ Himself established.
Mary Magdalene is a woman who loved Jesus all the way to the cross, who did not flee when everything seemed lost, and to whom the risen Christ spoke her name. And that name He spoke—Mary—He also speaks over you. He knows your first name, He knows your story, He knows the questions you no longer dare to ask. Yet despite all this, whoever we are, Jesus sends us to proclaim to our brothers and sisters, through the way we live and act, that God is alive.
May we imitate Mary Magdalene’s faithfulness and deep love for Jesus, and may we be just as eager to bear witness as she was. Happy Feast Day of St. Mary Magdalene.
Fr. Remy Coly, MSC
