56. St. Mary Magdalene: Love Strong as Death

"Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much." - Luke 7:47

The Gospel appointed for the feast of St. Mary Magdalene brings us into the house of Simon the Pharisee. A woman known in the city as a sinner enters uninvited, stands behind Our Lord weeping, washes His feet with her tears, wipes them with her hair, kisses them, and anoints them with ointment. Simon sees only her former life. Christ reveals what grace has made of her: "Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much."

The Roman Breviary tells us how to read this Gospel. Before giving the lessons of Pope St. Gregory the Great and St. Augustine, the First Nocturn places upon the lips of the Bride these words from the Canticle of Canticles:

"Put me as a seal upon thy heart, as a seal upon thy arm, for love is strong as death, jealousy as hard as hell, the lamps thereof are fire and flames. Many waters cannot quench charity, neither can the floods drown it." - Canticles 8:6-7

This is not an ornamental comparison. It reveals the interior mystery of St. Mary Magdalene's repentance. At Simon's table, at Calvary, and at the sepulchre, she shows what happens when mercy is received rightly. Forgiven love does not become casual. It becomes humble, costly, exclusive, and persevering.

The traditional exposition transmitted under the name of St. Gregory explains that the heart signifies our thoughts and desires, while the arm signifies our outward works. Christ is borne as a seal upon both when a soul loves Him inwardly and imitates Him outwardly.

St. Mary Magdalene bears this double seal. Christ is upon her heart because she comes in contrition and love. Christ is upon her arm because her love takes bodily form. She approaches Him despite human respect. She weeps. She bends low. She kisses His feet. She spends the precious ointment. She uses the hair that might once have served vanity as the humble instrument of penance.

Her actions are not an attempt to purchase forgiveness. The pardon comes from Christ. But grace does not leave her love invisible or idle. Her outward acts manifest the inward conversion already drawing her toward the Divine Physician.

This is why Our Lord contrasts her conduct with Simon's cold courtesy. Simon supplied no water for His feet, no kiss of welcome, and no oil for His head. St. Mary Magdalene's abundant service exposes the poverty of a respectability that can invite Christ into the house without surrendering the heart to Him.

St. Augustine asks who can resist death. Fire, waves, swords, and earthly rulers may sometimes be resisted, but death comes with a power no man can overcome by his own strength. Charity is compared to death because it too exercises a conquering power. St. Augustine says that love slays what we have been so that we may become what we were not. It produces a holy death by which the world is crucified to the Christian and the Christian to the world.

St. Francis de Sales develops the same doctrine. Bodily death separates the soul in fact from the body and from the things of this world. Sacred love makes that separation first in affection. The Christian remains alive and continues to fulfill the duties of his state, but created things no longer possess his heart as masters.

This holy death is visible in St. Mary Magdalene. She does not merely regret an embarrassing past. She allows the old life to die at the feet of Christ. The tears falling upon His feet are therefore more than emotion. They are contrition made visible: the waters through which a former way of living is renounced. The ointment also changes its meaning. What could have served luxury or display is poured out upon Our Lord. Love has conquered its former use.

At Simon's table, love proves stronger than the death of sin. At Calvary, it proves stronger than fear. At the sepulchre, it proves stronger than apparent abandonment. St. Mary Magdalene does not take pardon and return to vanity. She follows the One Who forgave her.

The word rendered "jealousy" can signify ardent zeal as well as destructive envy. The traditional Gregorian exposition explicitly preserves both meanings. Taken wickedly, envy is merciless: it was the burning hostility of Christ's enemies that pursued Him even to death. Such a fire consumes the one who carries it.

Taken as holy zeal, however, the phrase does not attribute a sinful passion to God or to the saint. It describes love's refusal of divided allegiance. The grave does not willingly surrender what it has seized; holy charity is likewise unyielding in refusing to hand the heart back to mortal sin, vanity, or any rival claimant.

This is the proper jealousy of the Bride: not the fear that another possesses what is mine, but the knowledge that my heart belongs wholly to Christ. St. Mary Magdalene can no longer make peace with the sins from which He delivered her. She cannot place Him among many interests. Mercy has not made sin small; it has made Christ everything.

The Gospel therefore judges both presumption and despair. Presumption wants pardon without the death of the old life. Despair believes the old life cannot be killed. St. Mary Magdalene answers both errors. Christ truly forgives, and His forgiveness truly changes the sinner.

Pope St. Gregory teaches that St. Mary Magdalene, once cold in sin, afterward burned strongly through love. When the disciples departed from the empty tomb, she remained. She sought the One Whom her soul loved, and because she alone persevered in seeking, she was the one permitted to see Him. Delay did not extinguish her desire; it made that desire more earnest.

St. John of the Cross points to the same scene when describing the soul that seeks the Beloved. St. Mary Magdalene is not detained even by the angels at the sepulchre. Angels are glorious creatures, but they are not the One for Whom she is searching. She cannot be satisfied with signs, messengers, memories, or consolations. She seeks Christ Himself.

Here the Canticle becomes visible at the tomb. The waters of grief cannot quench charity. The apparent triumph of death cannot drown it. The absence of sensible consolation cannot make it depart. Love remains before the sealed place and continues to ask, "Where hast thou laid him?"

Then Christ calls her by name. The love that refused false consolation receives the true Consoler. The woman who came silently to His feet is sent forth as a witness to His Resurrection.

St. Augustine's feast-day lesson presses the contrast sharply. The Pharisee presumes to judge both the woman and the Lord Who permits her approach. St. Mary Magdalene does not defend herself before him. Her tears, kisses, hair, and ointment speak a confession without excuses. She comes unclean so that she may depart cleansed, sick so that she may depart healed, confessing so that she may depart giving thanks.

Simon knows that she has sinned, but he does not understand what Christ can do with a sinner. That is the blindness of pharisaic pride. It can catalogue another person's disorder while remaining ignorant of its own need for mercy. St. Mary Magdalene sees more clearly because she kneels lower.

The measure given by Our Lord is not that sin becomes the cause of charity. Sin is evil and must be hated. Rather, the sinner who understands the greatness of the pardon has a powerful motive to love the Divine Forgiver. St. Mary Magdalene does not glory in what she was. She loves the One Who delivered her from it.

St. Mary Magdalene teaches the pilgrim in exile:

• bear Christ as a seal upon the heart by guarding the affections;
• bear Him as a seal upon the arm by making repentance concrete;
• do not ask for mercy while protecting a rival love;
• remain near the Cross and the sepulchre when consolation disappears;
• seek Christ Himself rather than religious excitement, signs, or human approval;
• let forgiven love become fidelity, service, and witness.

Souls wounded by their past sins should not allow shame to drive them away from Christ. St. Mary Magdalene went nearer. Souls wounded by confusion and betrayal should not imagine that grief excuses bitterness or instability. St. Mary Magdalene remained. Souls surrounded by counterfeit mercy should not accept reassurance without conversion. St. Mary Magdalene's pardon became a new life.

At Simon's table, love proves stronger than the death of sin. At Calvary, it proves stronger than fear. At the sepulchre, it proves stronger than apparent abandonment. St. Mary Magdalene bears Christ as a seal upon her heart through contrition and upon her arm through costly service. Because she loves much, she will not leave Him even when He appears to be dead and lost.

This is mercy without softness and repentance without despair. Christ does not despise the contrite soul. He forgives it, sets it on fire, and makes its former death the place from which persevering love begins to live.