The Suffering of the Son Confesses Our Sin

      When the Son is scourged naked and nailed naked to the cross, when the thorns and nails bite into his flesh, he has re-assumed the nakedness of the first man - not however, because of innocence, but rather because of sin, for his arms embrace all that is, was and will be. Everything, completely exposed, and in all its truth, is thrust upon the Naked One. For him, the one stripped of all power, the sum of that burden is no longer totally surveyable. It is not the result of an accumulation and summation during the years of his life; on the Cross the totality of the burden can no longer be subdivided in order to be dealt with in this fashion. What he has shouldered in a certain orderly manner now suddenly turns against him in all its weight like an alien external power, and it seems to him he does not have the slightest thing in common with all that he has taken upon himself. A neutral, anonymous power with no owner breaks upon him. Yet every spearhead of every sin is pointed towards him and wounds him.  His confession is now like the cry"Everything!" Here and there something specific appears and acquires contours, and then his cry becomes "That too!" 

When he cries out "Father, why have you forsaken me?" and "I am thirsty!" these cries are also an immense confession. The are an expression and answer to the enormous power of sin, which is the resonating response "For this reason" to his own question "Why?"....

For the Lord this encounter is particularly difficult, since it is the encounter of the totally pure with sin itself. When he as a man absolved someone from sin, as he did for example, with Mary Magdalene, he saw in the absolved person the results of his absolution. He suffered under the sin but rejoiced in the purification. Suffering and joy generated one another. Here, however, all subjective feeling is at an end, and there remains only a kind of objectivized experience of the terrible, a kind of suffocation and burial under the fatal burden of world guilt. 

 Confession, Adrienne von Speyr, pp. 51-52, 56

  

A Woman's Touch

 My posting of “Noli Me Tangere” provoked several reactions from women who disagreed strongly with my portrayal of Mary Magdalene. One told me “Mary would never have been so chatty!”  Another reminded me that the Magdalene was “a woman of her times”, and her first instinct would have been to throw herself at the feet of her Lord and Master. She would never have been so bold as to hug Him.  I have to agree. Those two perceptions are much more in touch with the Scriptural portrayal of Mary Magdalene, and more consistent with what little we do know of her character.

             I apologize for casting her as a modern day, assertive, independent, over-talkative woman, who didn’t know when to shut up. The way I portrayed her probably reveals more about me than it does about her. It probably shows the stereotypical women I am most familiar with, as a man of my times! Maybe my first posting of the event is a good picture of the way Christ would encounter the many Mary Magdalenes of our day?

            The posting that follows is an attempt to atone, and to respect the Magdalene by trying to come closer to the person she really is. I hope this account of her encounter with Christ also respects the fact that his gestures and movements speak to us even more eloquently than his words to her. To begin…

Mary Magdalene has thrown herself on the ground at the feet of the Risen Lord, whom she has recognized when He spoke her name.  Overcome by his presence and weeping with joy, she clutches at His feet, and presses her forehead in the dirt.

Christ: Do not hold Me. (John 20:17)

Bewildered, Mary dares to look up.  She gasps, stunned at what her eyes behold. He is bending over her. She sees every detail of his head at once. Her eyes “freeze” His face as if time were standing still.    Looking up, she absorbs his eyes shining at her, teeth white, mouth curved open in a joyous smile, beard and hair neatly groomed. Her memory flashes back to the blurred image of His face on Veronica’s towel, matted with hair, streaked with dirt and blood. She finds herself speechless. She also remembers His face above her as she stood under the cross, puffed, battered and misshapen.

 His right hand reaches down and firmly grasps her left arm just above the elbow.  He begins to pull her firmly but gently to her feet. She cooperates by getting her legs set beneath her, and pushing herself upwards.  Once standing, she is still dazed, and uncomfortable, her chest still heaving. She does not want to take her eyes off Him but cannot help from lowering her head and looking downwards.  

 Our Lord lets go of her arm, and puts his right hand under her chin.  He lifts her downturned face upward, toward Him. His gaze is as gentle as it is penetrating. She feels her legs strengthened and her whole self calmed by the love He communicates.

The Lord’s voice steadies her even more. She finds herself focusing entirely on His words as He says “I have not ascended to the Father”. (verse17). She hears the lighted-heartedness and also the gravity in his tone, and knows He is being playful and serious at the same time. Obviously there is no need to clutch Him since He has not gone anywhere. Her touching Him was never an issue. If it were, He would not be holding her now.  His voice continues: “Go to my brethren and say to them: ’I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God (verse 17).’”

The encounter is over. She is dazed, but has no doubt about what has happened. He happened.

But she is back in real time. She feels the breeze and the warmth of the sun. A nearby cricket “sings” tuneless notes for her. She tells herself she has something to do. Her body moves forward even though she has given it no conscious command. As her legs propel her, head and heart feel wonderfully united but disconnected from the rest of her. She ponders, wonders, loses herself in the event that took place. She realizes she has no way to express what just happened.

 (Yes I saw Him. Yes, He was new, the same but so alive and so different. Risen! I have no words to tell what He looks like. The apostles are going to think I am crazy or hysterical. Well, that is their problem, not mine. Hah, what does it matter what they think?  The only thing that matters is I carry His face burned into my heart. That will carry me through everything for the rest of my life.)

 “Then Mary Magdalene went and said to the disciples ‘I have seen the Lord!’ and she told them that He had said these things to her.” (verse18)

"Do Not Touch Me"

                         “NOLI ME TANGERE” is a fanciful exegesis of Christ’s encounter with Mary Magdalene in the garden after his Resurrection.  It is about Mary’s embrace of Our Lord in his Newness, and his ascensions before the Ascension. Christ’s conversations were usually longer than the short snippets found in the Gospels. We are told what is essential for us to hear.  Even that little is mysterious beyond our full comprehension. So it is helpful if we take the few lines the Spirit has moved the Gospel writer to give us and add some lines of uninspired dialogue to help us enter into the Mystery of what is done and said.

 Christ: “Do not touch me”! (John 20: 17)

Mary (Giddy with joy and dizzy with surprise): What!? How can I not touch you? I’m never going to let go of you! I can’t believe my eyes! If I ever let go of you, I would never believe you were in my arms! You are really alive?!  Is it you?

Christ: Of course I am.  You feel me don’t you? How can you have any doubt?

 She: Yes, it is you, but you are so different. I cannot put it into words. I don’t know how to say it. You are  so much more than you ever were, and everything I saw in you before is fresh and different. You are brand new.

He: Yes, Mary, I am risen. What did you expect? 

She: Nothing!  I didn’t expect anything. I thought you were dead and that was the end of it, the end of you. I was crazy with anger and pain. That’s why I was crying my eyes out. I missed you so much. You were gone, and the only thing I could feel was empty longing.

He: You have to let go of me now. I have something to do, "for I have not yet ascended to the Father."  (John 20: 17) And I have something for you to do too.

She: Not yet, not yet. I still can’t get it into my head that it really is you. Am I really holding you in my arms?

He: (laughing): Who would you be holding if not me? There is no one else in your arms. Who did you think I was?

She: The gardener. I thought you were the gardener.  

He (smiling):  That is also true. I am Gardener as well as Teacher. You should know that by now.

She: What do you mean?

He: Mary, where did the Man and the Woman first turn away from my Father?

 She: In the garden?

 He: Where did my agony begin?

She: In a garden?!

 He: What better place for me to flower afresh with new life than this garden? I make the world into my Father’s garden again. Mary, listen, you have to let go of me for now. This is not the time to hug me and celebrate my new life, because I have not yet gone back to the Father.

She (clutching): What has your Father got to do with it? You never pulled away from me before! Even when all those dirty-minded men were watching us as I washed your feet with nard, dried them with my hair, and kissed your toes.

He: I loved you touching me then and I love you hugging me now. But now is not yet the time to embrace and celebrate. My mission is not complete, and your work for me is not finished either. I am on my way to the Father now, and now I want you to go on your way to my disciples. As my mission is to go to Him, your mission is to go to them.

She: What are you talking about?

He: I have accomplished what the Father sent me to do.  Before I can appear to my brothers, I must present to the Father all I have done. My Work belongs to Him. My Dying belongs to Him, and my Rising also. I belong to Him in all I do. I am grounded in Him. I come from Him and return to Him. I go now for his blessing on all I have accomplished, on all He has worked in me and through me. Then I will bring to all of you the joy of my risen life. Then will my risen presence console my brothers. I cannot go to them without coming from Him. That is what my mission demands. When the Twelve see me again, I will be coming from the Father.

 She: I was so afraid I would never hold you again, never see you, never have contact with you. I thought I had lost you forever. You are really coming back? You are not going to leave us and stay with your Father?

 He: Mary, I know your fears.  Hear what I am telling you. You will have me forever, in an embrace that will never end. Now I must go to my Father, for your sake and my disciples’ sake. I must show Him all whom I have drawn to myself. I must sit at his right and tell him that my mission has been completed. You caught me in-between heaven and earth. You interrupted my return.

She: If going to Him is so urgent, why did you appear to me first? Why didn’t you just go?

He (smiling): As always, your tears melted my heart. I grant you a special privilege, an intimate blessing my brothers do not yet share. I permit you to see me before I return to the Father, so you see that I do nothing of myself. Everything I do has its origin in my Father and returns to Him, even this moment with you, and my sending you to my disciples, all that comes from Him.  

She:  When I think I understand I find I am more confused.  How can you be with the Father now and still be here with me? How does my going to your disciples come from Him? How do I know you will come back?

 He (smiling):  You never run out of questions.  One day you will have nothing more to ask me. At present you understand what I ask you to do, and that is sufficient. You are to “go to my brethren and tell them ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God ‘”. (John 20: 17) 

She: In those exact words? 

He: Yes. My Father is your Father. He never stopped being your Father, even when you stopped being his child. My Cross has cancelled out your sin and restored you to Him. Now my Father can call you and all my brothers his children again. Now the Father acknowledges all of you the same way He acknowledges me.

She: Why are you sending me to them?  They know what I was, who I was in the past. They are not going to believe you sent me. They will think I am a crazy, hysterical woman. They won’t believe you are alive unless YOU go to them.

 He:  I make you my apostle to the apostles. Blessed are you who bring the news of my rising to their ears. Do not fear, I will come from the Father, set my brothers’ hearts on fire, and they will continue my works.

She (babbling): How do I tell them about you without appearing crazy to them? They are going to ask me what you looked like, and, and how I know it was you, and am I sure I wasn’t seeing a ghost, or dreaming or whatever. How do I explain this to them?  

He:  Mary, tell them truth. You know I am real because you held me in your arms. It is impossible to touch a ghost.  

She: Yes but I have no words to tell them what you look like or how it feels to hold you and be held by you. 

He (laughing): Then tell them you have no words.  Seeing you without words should be a sign great enough to convince them that what you say is true. I must be a wonder if your words cannot capture me! Neither they nor I have ever seen you speechless! Now go!  I promise you that our meeting which you have managed to stretch out so long will one day become an unending embrace.

"Mary Magdalene went and announced to the disciples, 'I have seen the Lord!' and she told them that He had said these things to her."   (John 20:18)