Tuesday within Easter Octave – 19th April 2022 — Gospel: Jn 20,11-18
Life-Transforming Experience
Resurrection experience proves Mary Magdalene’s passionate love for Jesus. As a woman, she is overwhelmed by her loss and expresses tears of grief (20,11.13.15). While she is weeping and looking for risen Jesus, she sees him but does not realize it is He. When Jesus calls her by name as “Mary”, she does recognize him and establishes a personal bond with him. In that mutual recognition she is trying to =hold on to Jesus. After that, she becomes the first chosen to announce the good news of Jesus’ resurrection. When she proclaims, “I have seen the Lord”, she is referring to an experience far deeper and more real than simply a visual sight. It is a life-transforming experience, a deeply personal and mystical encounter. It is an experience of intimate and loving recognition, where Mary has moved from the darkness to the light of faith. She has seen Jesus as Lord, and she cannot help but become the messenger of that good news to others. Paul used her credential, “I have seen the Lord”. He used it to insist on his own authority as an apostle: “Am I not an apostle? Have I not seen Jesus our Lord?” (1 Cor 9,1). With Mary’s announcement, seeing has become an identity for the apostles and the model for transforming experience.
