Since this Sunday has an optional feast of Saint Mary Magdalene, of COURSE I'm going with it. What did you think?
So, in service of RevGals... if anyone's interested.... I will be happy to host a Tuesday lectionary leanings here, for the Mary Mag texts. They are:
Ruth 1:1-18
Psalm 73
Acts:13: 14-52
John 20:1-18
Sometimes I wonder about those lectionary people. For example, Ruth 1. OK. A story about women finding solidarity together. Maybe I could make something relating to Mary Magdalene from that.... but Acts 13? Anyone who can find the connection there, I'll send you a batch of homemade cookies. Psalm 73.... there is a passage about the evil done by others. Perhaps that could be invoked to talk of how the bonny pope maligned our Mary by saying she had the seven deadly sins cast out of her.
John 20 feels like the only way to go. Anyone?
13 comments:
John 20 is the way I'd go... still musing on the other texts??? (I'd sure like those cookies)... and of course bring in some mention of the fact that in the Eastern tradition, Mary M. is called "the apostle to the apostles".
I didn't realize that was an Eastern tradition, though I am familiar with the title... that might be my sermon title.
Are you familiar with the Mary/ Egg connection? There is a modern Icon (Robert Lenz?) which shows Mary holding a red egg, apparently related to a story in which she appears before an emperor (Caesar?) and the egg's color miraculously changes...? Do you know this, or better details about it? It's interesting... I wonder if this is where Easter eggs originate?
Here's the connection as well as I can make it. The first half of the actsd reading is our story, our history. They talked about who we remember and why. BUT they didn't tell the whole story (Moses, Adam and Eve and a whole bunch of other people aren't there). Who do we leave out of our stories, who do we include? Does it depend on the storyteller (i say yes). SO, we have the feast of Mary Magdeline to tell her story for our perpective today. Yeah, it's weak, but it's a starting point.
Preaching from the silences... I like that knittinpreacher! You might be in line for the cookies, too!
Peace,
Mags
I like that too!... and I haven't heard the egg story... I'll be looking for that.
As I recall, there are a number of paintings of her holding the egg.
Okay, I can't really take the credit for this as I read it in Augsburg Fortress' Sundays and Seasons, but I like the connection.
The first reading is a story of faithful women and the commitment that God uses for great purposes. The second reading tells the events of Jesus' death and resurrection and the activity of apostles, now witnesses to others. Mary Magdalene (in the gospel) embodies both--faithfulness/commitment and witness/"apostle to the apostles".
okay the egg story I used on Easter... (got from RGBP you know)... the 'tradition' or 'legend' is that MM went to Italy to visit Emperor Tiberius and to share with him Christianity. The Emperor said something akin to no man would die and then rise from the dead any more than that egg in your hand will turn the color of blood. And of course the egg did turn blood red... hence the Eastern Orthodox tradition of coloring 'easter eggs' blood red. ah ha!
However... think I'll look at "Rabbouni" and track it down. Used also in Mark 10:51 I think - the story of JC healing the blind man. When MM's eyes are "openend" she recongized JC and so... JC apparently is the key to opening our eyes right?
Oh just back from the optometrist today and my eyes got a work out!! Thankfully they didn't have to dialate them... but I was thinking of that as a metaphor for what JC does to our hearts... opens them to let more of his light in so we see Him and one another more clearly. Whew!
So here is what a friend who reads but doesn't post to my blog sent me by email, regarding the Acts text:
a. the lectionist couldn't bear a feast of mary and so included a text so packed with men and forebears of men and ancestors of men and jesus the man as an act of resistance.
b. preaching to the gentiles and bridging that gap alludes to the expanded role of women in the jesus movement.
c. mary is located in the phrase "devout and honorable women."
Interesting takes, all!
Mags
Silent, thanks for posting the Sundays and Seasons comments. They make sense to me.
I guess I worry about the lectionary some times. We try to make texts hang together that don't necessarily hang together. What I responded to my friend (whose comments I put in my previous comment) is, frankly, these texts feel like they're pulling away from each other, or even fighting each other.
This is a limitation of the lectionary. I think it's right and good to have scripture in dialogue with other scripture without trying to force it to "harmonize".
Hot Cup Lutheran, thanks for the full legend. Very helpful! And I really like your eyes theme... reminds me of another passage where eyes/seeing are all over, Hagar in the wilderness. "You are a God of Seeing."
Peace,
Mags
I used the Magdala egg legend for my children's time at Easter this year--dyed a bunch of red eggs and all (yep, I bet people got a chuckle out of the stained fingers at Eucharist).
I'm still at a loss, too, although I may emphasize faithfulness and perhaps talk about why she is considered the "apostle to the apostles."
Thanks for hosting this lectionary blog!
though i know you are not dealing with the martha/mary story (and it's the wrong mary), i wonder about the diakonia thing. the greek only appears in this passage in luke 10:38-42. but then it appears a whole bunch of times in acts -- including this one, i think. and it's only men that are in service. grrr.
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