St. Mary Magdalene: Apostle of the Apostles and Patroness of the Order of Preachers
Feast Day: July 22 | Patron of the Dominican Order, Penitents, Contemplatives, Perfumers, and the Falsely Accused
Who Was Mary Magdalene? The Question the Church Has Always Wrestled With
Before entering the glory of this saint’s life, honesty demands an acknowledgment: controversy over the identity of St. Mary Magdalene has continued since the early Church.
Mary Magdalen was so called either from Magdala near Tiberias, on the west shore of Galilee, or possibly from a Talmudic expression meaning “curling women’s hair.” In the New Testament she is mentioned among the women who accompanied Christ and ministered to Him (Luke 8:2-3), where it is also said that seven devils had been cast out of her.
In general, the opinions on who Mary Magdalene was tend to be divided along Greek and Latin lines. The Latin or Western Fathers of the Church generally hold that St. Mary Magdalene, the sinful woman, and Mary of Bethany are the same, while the Greek or Eastern Fathers hold that they are three different women. Scripture provides no clear solution to this question.
What is certain — beyond all dispute — is what she did and who she became after encountering Jesus. Despite the scholarly dispute over her background, what she did in her subsequent life, after meeting Jesus, is much more significant. She was certainly a sinner whom Jesus saved, giving us an example of how no person is beyond the saving grace of God.
The Seven Demons: Depths From Which She Was Lifted
Mary Magdalene, also known as the one “of Magdala,” is recognized as the woman from whom Jesus cast out “seven demons” (Luke 8:2) — suggesting she suffered either from severe demonic possession or, possibly, a grave illness.
This expression may mean seven individual demons, or, since the number seven can symbolize some kind of “perfection,” some hold that it simply means she was completely possessed. Others believe that it represents the practice of the seven deadly sins. Since the demons can associate with particular sins, and the capital sins collectively represent all sins, the three views are not incompatible.
Whatever the precise meaning, the theological point is unmistakable: Mary Magdalene came out of darkness so deep that only the power of God could reach her. And that is precisely why her story is inexhaustible — she is the proof that no soul is too far gone for the mercy of Christ.
Faithful Unto the Cross
Where the male Apostles fled, Mary Magdalene stood firm.
Mary Magdalene appears in the Gospels in the most dramatic moment of Jesus’ life, when she accompanies Him to Calvary and, along with other women, observes Him from afar. She is still there when Joseph of Arimathea places the body of Jesus in the sepulcher.
She proved she was among those who loved Him most when she stood at the foot of the Cross on Mount Calvary together with Mary, His Mother, and the disciple, St. John. She did not deny Him or run away in fear as the other disciples did, but remained close to Him every moment, up to and including the tomb.
This fidelity is not a small thing. When the Shepherd was struck, the sheep scattered — except for the women. And Mary Magdalene was at the center of that faithful remnant, held in place not by courage alone but by love.
The First Witness of the Resurrection: Apostola Apostolorum
Here is the crown of Mary Magdalene’s life — the moment for which all of history had been preparing her:
On the morning of the first day of the week, she returns to the tomb, finds the stone rolled away, and runs to warn Peter and John.
The two disciples return home but Mary Magdalene remains at the tomb in tears. Her initial disbelief gradually turns to faith when she sees two angels and asks them if they know where Jesus’ body has been taken. Then she sees Jesus Himself, but fails to recognize Him. She thinks He is the gardener, and when He asks why she is crying and who she is looking for, she replies: “Sir, if you have taken Him away, tell me where you have put Him and I will go and remove Him.”
But Jesus says her name, “Mary” — and she recognizes Him at once: “Rabbuni!”, she says, which in Hebrew means “Master!” Jesus then tells her: “Do not cling to me because I have not yet ascended to the Father; but go and find the brothers and tell them I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.” So Mary Magdalene goes to the disciples and tells them she has seen the Lord.
St. Mary is called “Apostle to the Apostles” because she was the first person Christ instructed to proclaim the Good News of His Resurrection to the Apostles (John 20:17). It is said that St. Hippolytus (c. 170–c. 235) gave her this title. And later, St. Thomas Aquinas himself dubbed her “the Apostle to the Apostles.”
This title is not honorary — it is theological. The Resurrection is the hinge of all human history, the event upon which everything depends. And God chose a woman — a woman who had been delivered from seven demons — to be its first herald. The logic of divine mercy is breathtaking.
The Tradition of Provence: Contemplation After Mission
According to a French tradition, Mary, Lazarus, and some companions came to Marseilles and converted the whole of Provence. Magdalen is said to have retired to a hill, La Sainte-Baume, nearby, where she gave herself up to a life of penance for thirty years. When the time of her death arrived she was carried by angels to Aix and into the oratory of St. Maximinus, where she received the viaticum.
Together they evangelized Provence, preparing themselves for each instruction by prayer and fasting, and confirming their testimony by miracles. But the holy penitent sighed after a life of solitude, that she might sit continually in spirit at those Divine feet which she had washed with her tears and anointed with the spikenard of great price.
In this, Mary Magdalene enacts the full arc of the Christian life: from sinner, to disciple, to apostle, to contemplative. She is not one thing — she is everything the soul can become when it surrenders entirely to Christ.
Mary Magdalene and the Order of Preachers
This is where her story intersects most beautifully with the Dominican family — and with the mission of every faithful Catholic who shares in that charism.
Because she carried the news of the Resurrection to the apostles, she was referred to as the “Apostle of the Apostles” (Apostola Apostolorum), and from the beginnings of the Order, she was proclaimed co-patroness of the newly founded apostolic Order of Friars Preachers.
In the thirteenth century, great efforts were put forth in France, Italy, and Germany to convert women who led sinful lives. When such conversions were made, bishops grouped these women together into communities who took St. Mary Magdalene as their patroness. In Germany, these communities of women were given the Constitutions of the Dominican Nuns and incorporated into the Dominican Order.
In 1286, Charles II turned the Dominican Order toward devotion to St. Mary Magdalene. In 1295, the Order was given care of the Shrine of St. Mary Magdalene at the Holy Cave — Sainte-Baume — in southeastern France.
In 1297, the feast of St. Mary Magdalene was celebrated with solemnity throughout the Order, as the General Chapter of Bologna had recommended.
Charles founded a convent of the Order on the spot and entrusted the precious treasures to the keeping of the Friars. Not content with this, the Prince founded no less than twelve convents of the Order, and in all of them it was ordained that a daily commemoration should be made of St. Mary Magdalene in the Little Office of the Blessed Virgin.
The Friars Preachers continued to be the faithful guardians of the relics at St. Maximin and of the sanctuary erected at La Sainte-Baume down to the time of the French Revolution.
Why Mary Magdalene Is the Perfect Patroness for Preachers
It seems that St. Mary Magdalene, in tradition and in literature, is constantly endowed with three characteristics: she is the converted sinner, she is the contemplative soul, and she is the herald of the Resurrection. These characteristics powerfully describe the preaching office and thus Dominican life. How can one speak of the mercy of God if one has not experienced it oneself? How can one speak of God without speaking with God?
Her penitence and complete trust in His mercy brought her to the point where the risen Christ opened her eyes and her mind to His new life. Her penitence led her to the Healer who then sent her with the healing news of the Gospel.
The holy penitent, St. Mary Magdalene, whose praise is in the Gospel, has ever been regarded as the particular protectress of the children of St. Dominic and especially of his Third Order. Our Lord Himself assigned her as mistress and patroness to St. Catherine of Siena.
This last detail is staggering: the Lord Himself, in a private revelation to St. Catherine of Siena — the great Dominican mystic and Doctor of the Church — assigned Mary Magdalene as her personal heavenly guide. The connection between these two women, across the centuries, bound together by the Dominican charism and the love of the same Lord, is one of the most beautiful threads in the tapestry of the Church.
Correcting the Modern Distortions
It must be stated clearly: pseudo-historical “research,” pulp fiction, and early second-century heresies have tried to suggest that she was married to Jesus. This is false — entirely without foundation in Scripture, Tradition, or credible history.
Nothing in secular history, nor Church history and Tradition, supports such claims. The only relationship between Jesus and Mary was that of Teacher and disciple, Savior and saved. This is the same love and friendship between the Lord and those whom He has redeemed — beginning with the Apostles and disciples who accompanied Him during His lifetime.
The revisionists cite the “gnostic gospels,” but these were rejected from the official canon of sacred Scripture because they lacked apostolic authorship, were heretical, and contained fictitious stories. One cannot counter Church tradition with spurious evidence from the gnostic gospels.
Her Elevation by the Church
Pope Francis elevated the memory of Mary Magdalene to the status of Festivity on July 22, 2016, in order to stress the importance of this faithful disciple of Christ.
This elevation — from a memorial to a feast — was a signal to the whole Church: Mary Magdalene’s witness is not a footnote. She stands at the very center of the Gospel, the first preacher of the Resurrection, the woman whose love refused to leave the tomb even when faith had not yet arrived.