Today the Church celebrates St. Mary Magdalene with the rank of Feast, a dignity reserved for saints of exceptional importance. She is the woman Christ chose to be the first witness of his Resurrection, the one he sent to tell the Apostles, earning her the ancient title “Apostle to the Apostles.”
Who Mary Magdalene was
Mary came from Magdala, a fishing town on the Sea of Galilee’s western shore. The Gospels identify her as one from whom Christ cast out seven demons (Luke 8:2), after which she became one of the women who followed him and supported his ministry from their own means. She appears at the foot of the Cross in all four Gospels, remained to see where his body was laid, and returned to the tomb at first light on the third day.
What we know of her comes entirely from Scripture. Later legends conflated her with other women in the Gospels, particularly the sinful woman who anointed Christ’s feet in Luke 7, but the Eastern tradition has always kept these figures distinct. Pope Gregory I’s sixth-century identification of Mary Magdalene with that unnamed sinner shaped Western piety for centuries, though modern scholarship recognizes them as separate persons.
She stands in the Gospel narrative as a model of conversion, devoted service, and faithfulness. Where the male disciples fled, she stayed. Where they hid, she went seeking.
What she’s known for
Mary Magdalene’s defining moment comes in John 20. She finds the empty tomb, runs to tell Peter and John, returns weeping to the garden, and encounters the risen Christ. She mistakes him for the gardener until he speaks her name. He then gives her the first commission of the new covenant: “Go to my brethren and say to them, I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God” (John 20:17, RSV-CE).
This is why the Church Fathers called her “Apostle to the Apostles.” An apostle is one sent with a message. Christ sent her before he sent anyone else. Her iconography reflects this witness: she appears with the alabaster jar of ointment from the burial preparations, often weeping, her long hair unbound in grief that becomes recognition, wearing the red robe of one who proclaims.
For today
Read John 20:11-18 slowly, once. Notice how Christ doesn’t reveal himself until Mary turns toward him fully and hears her name. Ask yourself where you’re seeking Christ in places he’s already left, and where he might be standing behind you, saying your name.
Stay with the question through your morning. Let her witness sharpen your own.
Carry her name through the day.
