"The Passion without Mary has no love. Without Mary, the Passion narrative sounds like victimization, hate, cruelty, abandonment and misery. Christianity lost the transformative love in favor of hate and victimization. Because the unvoiced and silenced Mary Magdalene carries the transformative power of love. And when you silence her out of it you change the whole nature of christianity from substitutive love to atonement theology.”
-Cynthia Bourgeault, Lecture

Without Mary, the Passion narrative sounds like victimization, hate, cruelty, abandonment and misery. Think about it for a moment. The Biblical stories don’t put much detail into the violence of Good Friday, but we do. We show a bloody, battered Jesus, right there in the front of church. I know pastors, who gather 12 men, Last Supper style to read the passages of violence, betrayal and denial. There are famous enactment of the violence in Europe, you can even get a tour package to The Oberammergau Passion Play, that includes a hearty reenactment. The church likes the passion story so much we named it, good.

Why do we love violence?
When I was heading to seminary, The Passion of The Christ opened on Ash Wednesday 2004 and while there were flashbacks to better times, it followed the 12 most terrific hours of Jesus’ life. There was so much violence, one reviewer, David Edelstein of Slate called it “Jesus Chainsaw Massacre” and likened it to a violent “snuff” film. Despite controversy regarding the Pope’s approval and rampant anti-semitism, this film was the fifth highest earner at the box office and despite the R ratting, evangelical churches packed into the theaters. Youth groups have watched this together, as a part of their programing…on purpose. Somehow, exposing yourself and others to the most violent depiction of Jesus’ life, exposing yourself to trauma and violence became an act of spirituality, an avenue for growth.

How did we get here?
This is not what the Gospels do. Paul does not rehash every gross detail in his letters. The Gospels do not linger long on the violence. The early church held a diversity of rituals celebrating connection and love poured out, not through violence - but despite violence. These folks practice love, console, and substitutive love. The early church did not linger in graphic violence or give ink the details of Rome’s inhumanity. They knew about crucifixion, it happened everywhere and all the time, the violence was not unique.

The early church did not linger in graphic violence or give ink the details of Rome’s inhumanity.
But We Do. During the rule of Holy Roman Emperor Charlemagne, the church made a shift - and when I say the church made a shift, I mean he helped give the church a ‘nudge' by promoting some priests and silencing others. Violence became spiritual. The trauma of Jesus became a primary expression of his passion for us and a primary path for our own connection to God. Friday became Good.

Most of our churches are not inclined to wonder why, to consider who this kind of theology serves and what it says about God, needing a bloody sacrifice to be connected to us. We are some how obsessed with the ugliest part of Holy Week and you really have to do a lot of homework if you even want to think about it; let alone question it.

We go from absolute silence on Friday to Singing “Up From the Grave He Arose” on Sunday, like its magic. From the biggest to the smallest church, there are hymns filled with language of triumph and might; blood that washes us clean and sacrifices that free us from our sins.

Mary shows a different way
The resurrection stories are nothing like our songs, they are messy and human, they are filled with grieving people experiencing connection and love despite the very worst storms of inhumanity. They may have triumph but it is not the kind of triumph an empire experiences.
Mary Magdalene is the one who shows us how to practice our faith. She is the one who never leaves Jesus. She stays as Rome’s brutality is on full display. She doesn’t betray like Judas, deny like Simon Peter or leave like the rest of the men. She doesn’t say, “Hey I have a thing I got get too” or “this is too much, I’m out.” She doesn’t look around and say, “you know what we really need right now, a creed. That totally would have helped Peter, James, and John stick it out.”
She does nothing and everything. She stays at the cross, she offers her presence and heart, she offered what comfort and care she can. She advocates and organizes with Jospeh of Arametha to bring Jesus to a place of rest. She stays at the tomb and she is the one who proclaims resurrection. She is the first preacher of Easter and she is apostle to the Apostles. And I wish our Church looked a little bit more like her.

Anointing
Every Gospel tells the story of a woman, with an alabaster jar anointing Jesus at the table. She enters to the surprise of some and the scorn of others. In every Gospel she opens the Jar and pours out this extravagant gift, sometimes on his head and sometimes on his feet, so expressive and intimate, her hair and tears and hands spread this ointment and express this great love.

In Luke (7:36-47) Jesus is at the home of a religious leader, and as Luke dives into the dirty details, she is a sinner. The kind of woman you don’t take home to Mom - if you know what I mean. The religious leader objects, “what kind of woman is this” and what kind of prophet are you Jesus to let a woman like this burst in here and touch you.

Jesus gives a lesson about forgiveness and hospitality. 500 years latter, Pope Gregory the Great will build on Luke’s gospel to say this sinner was Mary Magdalene and that her sin was the kind of sin that raises the eyebrows of good church people. You know what I mean…it’s a sexy sin.

This comes right as the church works to officially ban women from ministry. Mary’s story and voice had lived on in the hearts of the people, in lore and legend and love. Her leadership challenged Peter and Rome by her very presence. The Pope helped silence her and every woman the easiest way he could; talk about their sexuality or perhaps more accurately, blame women’s bodies rather than deal with your own struggles around your own sexuality. (Honestly the Pope really gets into it, the perfume she once used for her sinful sex work, she now repents and pours out on Jesus. He goes down this path without one thought or care for folks forced into sex work or how there might be a community sin at play. Don’t worry 1,600 years later the Catholic Church apologized.)

Anointing is no small matter, that’s why its in every Gospel. It’s an expression of intimacy, healing and love. It is an expression of the sacred. Kings are anointed. The dead are anointed. The Bride anoints the Groom. Prophets anoint leaders. Priestly healers anoint people seeking wholeness of body, mind and spirit. Anointing is an act of connection, commitment, renewal and rebirth. It is a practice of love.

Matthew (26:6-13) and Mark (14:3-8) share the story, the details are different. This time the men a the table object and they are the same men who have been hanging around with Jesus the whole time. They don’t like the cost. This money could have been used better. That’s the narrative to silence folks, she is foolish and emotional and irresponsible, they may have well said, “this foolish woman squandered a years wages on perfume.” It is expensive, the nard or ointment is likely imported from the Himalayan mountains and likely costs three hundred denarii in a time when one day’s labor earned one single denarii. The cost is high. The gift is extraordinary.

It is expensive but it is not foolish or reckless. It is a gift, it is a practice of abundance and faith. Jesus rebukes the men and says this story will be told in remembrance of her. Where ever the good news is shared, people will remember her. Except we don’t have her name.

In Remembrance of HER
Only one Gospel, John remembers her name, Mary (John 12: 1-8). Mary, Lazarus’ sister, opens the alabaster jar and fills the room with perfume, Mary anoints Jesus in love. Because Mary understand what is to come, she knows that unless Jesus backs down or gives up his deep passion for God’s loving world, he will face the wrath of Rome. She knows what is ahead, she knows he will die and so she makes and extraordinary gift. She may be Mary of Bethany and with oral tradition and modern scholarship in mind, she may indeed be Mary the Tower, Mary called Magdalene. The one we look to in the storm. (We inherit a tradition where spiritual transformation changes one so much it changes even a name, Simon to Peter the Rock. I’m not sure one can ever know, the way we might know the facts on a brith certificate but we might find a sense of deep truth.)

The truth is Mary Magdalene shows us what faith looks like, and how to practice it with courage, reverence and love. Jesus tells the Disciples to love one another and Mary shows them one more time.

She stays right there. Jesus is not alone. Peter may have denied him, Judas may have betrayed him, every man listed in the Gospel of Matthew may have run away but the women are right there. That’s what love looks like.

She loves beyond the pain and trauma and violence. She witnesses to Jesus’ reality. She will not leave him alone. I imagine them both catching a scent of the perfume on the breeze. The women calling out, singing out, reminding him he not alone. She stays at the tomb. She organizes his burial and she prepares to anoint him one more time.

In the grief and longing, the fuzzy morning, she sees through the eye of her heart, Jesus is not gone. She hears him and senses him. And she is the first preacher of Easter’s resurrection. She is the apostle to the Apostles. She embodies Paul’s phrase, “Love Never Dies.” She echos the ancient poetry “Set me like a seal on your heart, for love is as strong as death” (Song of Songs).

She can do this because she has done the hard work, she has grappled with her demons, she has committed to a way of love and practiced seeing with the eye of her heart. That’s why she anointed Jesus.

See, anointing is a sacred symbol of connection with the divine and one another. It is the central ritual of love. Mary knows Jesus is on a path towards death, unless he decides to back down, she know this brutality is certain. She anoints him and this isn’t an accident or flippant or foolish, it isn’t an overly emotional woman. It is everything.

Christ is not Jesus’ last name, it is a word that means, Anointed One. Christ means Anointed one. The early church will talk about their community in connection with the ritual of anointing. They follow the anointed one. Mary is the prophet who anoints Jesus.

I wish our Holy Week patterns had a day for anointing. It’s so easy for us to disregard when we wave palms and break bread, we wash feet, hammer nails and extinguish candles on Good Friday. We need this teaching from Mary. Love is extravagant and ordinary, it may not be reasonable on a spreadsheet. It has nothing to do with eternal damnation or original sin, but everything to do with showing up and staying present. The disciples object because they know the cost and they don’t want to pay it. They are not ready it is to much, they would prefer Jesus turn away or negotiate or leave or fight with a sword.

Love means giving, it means staying in pain, it means going alongside. Mary acts in abundance. Transformative love, knows the cost is high and gives anyway. May we have the courage.