I'm Not Who You Think I Am

I am one of the most misunderstood figures in the New Testament. I have been called a repentant whore. Some people say I was the adulterous woman whom The Master saved from a death by stoning. I was accused of wasting an alabaster jar of expensive ointment by rubbing it on my poor Master's tired feet. I was maligned by many throughout the history of Christianity. But today, people are looking at me differently. This past June, the Church elevated my day in the Church's calendar (July 22) to the status of a liturgical feast, equal to the feast days of The Twelve. Indeed, the great theologian and Doctor of the Church, St. Thomas Acquinas has called me "The Apostle to the Apostles." My name is Miriam, you probably call me Mary. I am the Magadelene.

Let me explain: I am mentioned specifically 12 times in the Gospels. More than most of the Twelve. Every time I am named in the Gospels with other women, my name comes first. This shows prominence and importance, just as Peter is named first among the Apostles. Not much is said about me. Mostly, they speak of my being blessed to be the first person to have seen and spoken with the Risen Christ, and how He commanded me to go tell the others what I had seen. That is what the Church officially remembers and celebrates about me today. Because I brought the Good News to them, I am called "The Apostle to the Apostles."

But early in the history of the Church, other things were said about me. Over the early centuries, my story was confused and conflated with other women in the Gospels: The adulteress who was about to be stoned, the repentant woman of bad moral character who wept near Jesus, letting her tears fall on his feet and drying them with her unbound hair (a sign of a prostitute).
I was cured of seven demons by Jesus. In those times, that phrase was often used to describe physical maladies or illnesses. But once a Pope, Gregory the Great, in a series of sermons on the value of repentance said those seven demons were the seven deadly sins.

There has been confusion as to what my identity was. Scripture just says I was from Magdala, which was a town on the western shore of the Sea of Galilee. But there were those who believed I was really Mary of Bethany, the sister of Martha and Lazurus.

In more modern times, there have even been some books and a motion picture which claim that I was married to Jesus, and as the Holy Grail, I bore his child. They claim our descendants are alive in France today. But there is no historical evidence to support thst theory.
I won't tell you the whole story of who I am here, I will leave that for you to discover and decide for yourself. But I will say this: The Master chose me, a woman, to be the first to witness His Resurrection! That's how I want to be remembered.