Feast of Saint Mary Magdalene

The Lord tells Mary Magdalene, “Stop holding on to me.”

At first, we can understand this simply as a very human moment. Mary thought Jesus was dead, and suddenly he is standing before her. Of course she runs to him. Of course she embraces him and holds on, perhaps a little too tightly. We can imagine doing the same thing if someone we loved had been gone for a long time—someone we thought we would never see again—and then suddenly appeared before us. We would not want to let go.

Perhaps, on that first level, Jesus is simply saying, “You have to let go now. There is still work to be done.”

But there is something deeper happening here, because Jesus adds, “I have not yet ascended to the Father.” Those words suggest that the problem is not merely that Mary is holding him too tightly. The work is not yet complete, and neither is her faith. Mary truly recognizes the risen Lord, but she does not yet understand everything that has happened. She has encountered the reality of the Resurrection, but she has not yet grasped its full meaning.

What she holds in her arms is truly Christ. Yet the image of Christ that she carries within her heart is still incomplete. It must be purified, deepened, and corrected.

We can see this throughout the encounter. Mary arrives at the tomb and sees two angels sitting where the body of Jesus had been. In almost every other encounter with angels in Scripture, people are terrified and must be told, “Do not be afraid.” Mary, however, speaks to them almost as if they were ordinary people. Her grief is so great that she cannot recognize the wonder unfolding before her.

Then she turns and sees Jesus himself, but mistakes him for the gardener. Again, her grief prevents her from seeing clearly. Only when Jesus calls her by name does she recognize him.

Mary comes to genuine faith in the Resurrection, but even then there is more for her to understand. Notice what she tells the Apostles: “I have seen the Lord.” She does not yet proclaim the great Christian formula, “He is risen.” She simply bears witness to what she has experienced: “I have seen him.” She knows that it is Jesus, but she does not yet have the words to explain everything she has seen or everything it means.

The other disciples will undergo the same gradual process. They will slowly come to accept the Resurrection. Thomas will doubt until the Lord appears and shows them his wounds. Jesus will continue appearing to the disciples until the truth finally begins to sink in. Some of them will even return to fishing, as though nothing has changed.

None of them fully grasps the mystery at once. They all have more to learn. Their faith must continue to grow.

Perhaps this is what Jesus is saying to Mary Magdalene: “You possess part of the truth. You know that the Lord is risen. Go and proclaim what you know—but do not imagine that you have already understood everything. There is still more to come.”

The same can be true for us. As we begin to learn the faith, we naturally form certain ideas and explanations. Those ideas may be true, but still incomplete. The danger comes when we cling to them so tightly that we stop growing. We become so attached to an earlier understanding that we no longer listen. We no longer allow the Lord to deepen and mature our faith.

But the Lord does not want us to remain where we began. He continually draws us forward, allowing our faith to mature so that we may grow and flourish in his presence.

We must therefore hold the truths of faith firmly, but with a heart that remains teachable. We must never cling so tightly to our own limited understanding that we can no longer hear the Lord speaking. We must allow him to deepen what we already know and lead us into a fuller understanding.

Christ is not giving us some radically new revelation. Rather, he helps us understand more deeply what he has already revealed. He continues to open that revelation within each of our hearts so that we may know him more fully, love him more deeply, and draw ever closer to him.