An Encounter With Jesus
One
This meditation, drawn from the book Mary Magadlene, Prophetess of Eucharistic Love
We can imagine something of that moment of grace when Magdalene first felt called out of the darkness into God’s wonderful light.
The exact nature of Mary’s past life remains open to speculation, for all Scripture says about it is that she was known to be a sinful woman from whom seven demons went forth. Seven is the number that expresses completion or totality, and to speak of seven demons may suggest that she was afflicted by all kinds of sinful habits. She had done it all, so to speak. Demonic activity and sinful behavior always go hand in hand, and the more the former is present the more disordered is the latter.
An ancient tradition says that Mary was of very wealthy stock and that her father was a man called Syrus, who owned property all over Israel. Upon the death of their father, her brother Lazarus remained in Jerusalem, while Bethany became the home of Martha, and Mary lived in a family property by the Sea of Galilee, in a coastal town called Magdala. She quickly became the subject of conversation in the town, for she was as beautiful as she was wealthy and such a combination often attracts the worst company.
After several years in this dark world of the rich and famous, however, she was left with nothing but a bitter heart and a troubled conscience. Every soul is made for infinite love, and when that love is sought outside of God, before long the soul finds itself in a state of sad frustration, especially when it has been created with a special capacity to love intensely. Magdalene began to grow sick of shallow, worldly conversations and longed for somebody to tell her the true meaning of her life.
Two
She was not in the habit of listening to preachers, but of late she had been experiencing such an inner torment from unsatisfied desire that she was ready to give anything a try.
Mary Magdalene had reached the critical state that can lead to an awakening of the spirit and the discovery of true happiness, if only the person can humbly recognize he is powerless and admit his need for God and turn to him.
As reluctant as she was to take this last step, she saw a glimmer of hope in what people were saying about Jesus…They said his words were deep and beautiful, demanding, but always bringing hope and peace to those who heard them. So she decided to give him a chance.
Perhaps she made her way to the place where he was said to be preaching, upon some hilltop overlooking the Sea of Galilee, part of her felt a strange joy at the thought of what she was going to hear, but another part of her felt deep fear, almost panic, in the face of what was about to happen.
As she came nearer the crowd she felt an irresistible force pulling her towards Jesus. She made her way forwards through the crowds, noticing that some people were clearly uncomfortable on seeing such a woman there. As she passed by in her somewhat inappropriate attire, she thought she heard a few accusing whispers of the word “hypocrite”; but she boldly continued to squeeze her way through the crowd and eventually found herself a spot not far from where Jesus was speaking.
She caught a glimpse of his face as he glanced in her direction. In that brief instant of eye contact with the Messiah, eternal life began for Mary Magdalene. Her heart experienced something that it had never known before. As his penetrating gaze rested momentarily upon her, a holy sense of reverence gripped her soul; for an instant she was awestruck.
As he began to speak he would regularly look directly into her eyes, and he seemed to be gazing right through them, into the very depths of her soul. Never had a man looked at her in such a way. In his gaze there was nothing that made her feel insecure. Every man she knew either looked at her in a way that made her feel worthless or looked at her as if she were an object to use, but in these eyes there was something different. Although she felt unworthy to look into his eyes she was unable to turn away. His gaze reminded her of the way her father used to look upon her as he would carry her in his arms and tell her how precious she was. It was the purest look of a father into the eyes of his little girl, and it made her feel safe. She felt as though the presence of this man was making her into a child once again, restoring to her something that she had lost long ago.
Three
As her soul now felt more and more drawn to embrace that spiritual light which surrounded Jesus, all of a sudden she was aware of another contrary movement holding her back. The memory of her sins came flooding back, and against her own will accused herself of their gravity and the utter impossibility of ever finding God’s forgiveness. A river of sad and miserable images of shameful things she had done went racing through her mind and caused a deep movement of despair to run through her entire being. In these moments she felt certain that she had gone too far ever to seek forgiveness from God.
In the past this despair would leave her with dark desires for total self-destruction, but this time it was different. Even though these thoughts were perhaps stronger than ever before, the man in front of her seemed even stronger. As she glanced towards him again, a spark of hope returned, and now his previously gentle presence seemed to become power itself.
Four
The Teacher continued to speak to the crowds, but now it seemed as though he was speaking to her alone, speaking not to her mind but right into the very depths of her heart. He spoke now of the mercy of God, of how he had been sent to seek out and save the lost, of how the Lord looks with preferential love upon a humble and contrite heart, of how sinners could dare to approach the Most High and return home justified. His words entered into her heart like no words she had ever heard before. His words seemed as though they were taking life within her and coming to dwell in her forever, and as she welcomed them into her heart the other accusing thoughts began to disappear. The truth of what he was saying could not possibly be doubted or resisted. It would be easier now to doubt her own existence than to doubt the mercy of God, and within her welled up the words “Lord, have mercy on me a sinner.” As she repeated these words over and over again, the dark heavy weight that for almost as long as she could remember had seemed to be crushing the very spirit within her suddenly lifted. She felt true freedom for the first time in her life, and it was something very different from the reckless freedom she had proudly flaunted, while all the time she had really been enslaved to sin. The chains of evil that had bound her heart were broken, the darkness that had trapped her within her very self was gone, and she experienced not just freedom but pure joy.
Five
She was a sinner: she had done things that the mere thought of now caused her to blush; she had done things that now she could not even understand. Why had she lived so shamefully? It all seemed so unreasonable and pointless to her now. It was as though these things had somehow been done by another person, and to recall them was like looking back into the tomb of that person who was now dead and gone. A new existence had begun the moment she had looked into those mysterious eyes. These sins belonged to her and she was sorry for every last one of them, but in some way she felt as though the guilt of them no longer belonged to her. She began to weep, not because she felt ashamed and knew that she would forever have to bear the burden of her reputation, but rather because she realized that all along God had been there.
As she walked towards Magdala, as evening began to fall, her tears continued to flow, but they were accompanied by the inner conviction that no matter what she had done, the good God would forgive her and give her a second chance at life.