“Conversion is a daily thing.”

Conversion is not implanting eyes, for they exist already; but giving them a right direction, which they have not. - Plato

Gospel Text: (JN 20:1-2, 11-18)
On the first day of the week,
Mary Magdalene came to the tomb early in the morning,
while it was still dark,
and saw the stone removed from the tomb.
So she ran and went to Simon Peter
and to the other disciple whom Jesus loved, and told them,
“They have taken the Lord from the tomb,
and we don’t know where they put him.”

Mary stayed outside the tomb weeping.
And as she wept, she bent over into the tomb
and saw two angels in white sitting there,
one at the head and one at the feet
where the Body of Jesus had been.
And they said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping?”
She said to them, “They have taken my Lord,
and I don’t know where they laid him.”
When she had said this, she turned around and saw Jesus there,
but did not know it was Jesus.
Jesus said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping?
Whom are you looking for?”
She thought it was the gardener and said to him,
"Sir, if you carried him away,
tell me where you laid him,
and I will take him.”
Jesus said to her, “Mary!”
She turned and said to him in Hebrew,
“Rabbouni,” which means Teacher.
Jesus said to her,
“Stop holding on to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father.
But go to my brothers and tell them,
‘I am going to my Father and your Father,
to my God and your God.’”
Mary Magdalene went and announced to the disciples,
“I have seen the Lord,”
and then reported what he told her

Today, we celebrate with joy Saint Mary Magdalene because her journey to God could very well be similar to our own.

In Mary Magdala’s story, we discover some important aspects of our faith. In the first place, we admire her courage. Though a gift from God, faith requires courage from the believer. Generally, we tend towards what we can see, what can be seized with our hand. God being essentially invisible, faith “represents the risky enterprise of accepting what plainly cannot be seen as the truly real and fundamental. It involves a leap out of the tangible world” (Benedict XVI).

On the other hand, the "leap to faith" «is reached through what the Bible calls conversion or repentance: only he who changes receives it "(Benedict XVI). Was not this Mary’s first step? Should not this also be a reiterated step in our lives?

In the conversion of Magdalene, there was much love: she did not spare anything. Here is another "vehicle" of faith - love. In John’s Gospel it clearly appears «believing is to listen and, at the same time, to see (...)». In that dawn, Mary Magdalena takes risks for her Love, she listens to her Love (to hear Him saying "Mary" is enough for her to recognize Him) and she meets the Father. «On the morning of Easter (...), Mary Magdalena, is asked to contemplate Him as He ascends to the Father, and finally to her full confession "I have seen the Lord" (Jn 20:18)» (Pope Francis).

Once again, Jesus did something unexpected. He chose someone unexpected, someone many would have disregarded, for one of the greatest honors of history. Whatever kind of bondage Mary had suffered, it didn’t disqualify her in Jesus’ eyes. And neither are we disqualified, whether by past sins or current disabilities. Jesus came for just this reason, to deliver us from all that binds us and to fill us with dignity, calling us children of God.  He calls us, each by name, to share in eternal life with him and transforms us through the power of his Holy Spirit so that we, too, can be witnesses to his resurrection.