She Jesus: His Wounded Side

This past Sunday my church celebrated a quiet Pentecost. The Worship Team wanted to celebrate Pentecost next Sunday because the youth and many parishioners were celebrating Canada’s Victoria Day weekend camping. The Team did not think the Spirit would mind or care switching the day to include everyone. Mind you, this coming Sunday will be Pentecost for the Eastern Orthodox Traditions.  So, the Spirit of my church will be in keeping with the Spirit of Orthodox Worshipers.  Nice.

For Orthodox Traditions, Pentecost celebrates the death of sinful mankind and the resurrection or the rebirth of mankind.  https://oca.org/orthodoxy/the-orthodox-faith/worship/the-church-year/pentecost-the-descent-of-the-holy-spirit

Mary is the first human being to realize the goal of the incarnation: the deification of humanity. As such she represents the Church of Christ and should be honoured as the Mother of the Church. https://orthodoxwiki.org/Icons_of_the_Theotokos

However, Mary and many women have suffered at the hands of church people and their councils who insist the Son and the Father are Divine while Mary is not.

In the Church that Mary gives birth to, men and women should be equal. They should be ONE. There should be no divisions among them because God who is Holy is with them.  The Church should honour and recognize their Mother as Holy because in my view she is Jesus the Vine. (John 15:1; Psalm 128:3) She and her children are her branches, the Church, the Risen Christ.

The early church viewed Mary Magdalene as being one and the same as Mary the Mother of Jesus (Vogt Turner p. 3-4, Mary Magdalene: her image and relationship to Jesus) So why are many people today having trouble seeing Mary Magdalene as Mary the Theotokos and the Mother of the Church?

John’s Gospel says that Mary Magdalene stood outside the Tomb crying. When the Angels asked her why, she told them she was looking for her Lord. When Mary encounters Jesus the Teacher in the Garden of the Tombs.  She thinks he might be the Gardener, the Lord she is looking for. He assures her he has not assumed his body.  As Jesus the Teacher speaks with her face to face, they begin to see and understand each other more clearly. Jesus the Teacher recognizes her as Mara, someone whose experience and story are an exceedingly bitter one. (John 20:13-18).

For centuries, many people saw Mary as the scarlet woman who revealed her unbridled love for the Teacher to the authorities by kissing his feet and wiping them with her unbound hair. Now many Church authorities insist Mary Magdalene is not the Adulteress of John’s Gospel or the Sinner Woman of Luke’s Gospel. I sometimes feel like a traitor when I point out to the Biblical authorities that there is evidence in the Scripture to suggest Jesus the Teacher was married to Martha and had an affair with the Woman called the Magdalene. Since I successfully defended my thesis, Mary Magdelene: her image and relationship to Jesus, I published The Ecumenical Affair to use my own personal experience to corroborate my thesis and to reveal Jesus the Teacher to the authorities as a married man who spent the night with Jesus the Woman.

Every Easter people in the Cretan Village of Vamos dress a scarecrow as Judas and seat it on a donkey. Then they parade it through the streets, hurl insults at it and then toss it on the bonfire at Midnight on Easter Saturday. They do this to “symbolize the cruel fate of the traitor.”  http://www.vamosvillage.gr/vamos-village/local-festivals

So, I was cautious this past Sunday when the Worship Team at my church chose to have me read the lesson from John’s Gospel chapter 20: 19-22 instead of the traditional Acts and John readings.  I did not want to appear as a traitorous figure. The passage I read follows after Mary and Jesus the Teacher stand outside the Tomb face to face and he tells her to go and tell his brothers that he must rise in front of the Lord, his Father and hers. When Mary Magdalene announces to the disciples that she has seen the Lord and tells them about what Jesus the Teacher has said to her, many people may not see or hear the subtle distinction of the Trinity here. Patriarchal language and the perception that Jesus is one person who somehow incarnates the Trinity prevents many people from seeing how Jesus comes in three persons to unite their followers.

Dressed in red to symbolize the scarlet love of Mary Magdalene and the flaming tongues of fire representing the Holy Spirit, I took my place on the seat behind the Pulpit and waited for a male choir to sing the anthem: Veni Creator Spiritus. Then I stood up and read.

¹⁹ When it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and the doors of the house where the disciples had met were locked for fear of the Jewish authorities, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.” ²⁰ After Jesus said this, Jesus showed them his hands and his side, his rib. Then the disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord. ²¹ Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” ²² When Jesus had said this, Jesus breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit.”

I tried to make it as plain as possible using myself and personal experience as a visual aid, hoping my red hair and red dress would trigger their Biblical memory.

In my heart and mind, the Woman known as Mary Magdalene is the Woman Jesus the Holy Spirit. In John’s Gospel, after clearing her eyes and realizing Simon is the Lord, the Jesus Rock and her promised Bridegroom, She Jesus goes and stands among the disciples and gives them her breath, her personal words of assurance and inspiration that Peace, the Shulamite Bride in Solomon’s Song, has returned to life and regained her sovereignty as the Holy Spirit. As such she is the Lord’s beloved bride and worthy life companion. She too is eternal and a sovereign person in her own right. Over the centuries, she has suffered abuse at the hands of men and women and her own fears and lack of faith. She however stands as a testimony to God’s promise.

The children of Moses can trust the words of the Prophets, the Psalms and Moses. The Last Days may still seem far off for many. But with the very real threat of climate change and war, I think the time is here. Jesus has returned and it is time realize the importance of forgiveness and good stewardship.  Peace embodied by She Jesus herself sends the Church into the world to suffer and share the work of loving each other and forgiving each other’s offences as the Father, the Teacher and She have done and are doing—secure in the knowledge that God’s earthly family can trust in the promise that GOD’S EARTHLY FAMILY is the inheritor of Eternal Life. Jesus is the Father, the Teacher and his beloved Martha and the Holy Spirit. Reconciled and united as One, HE/THEY testify to that promise.