Putting on our imagination cap, our Gospel today is one easily entered. This scene of Mary Magdalene grieving her lost friend is one we can empathize with, if not know intimately in our own journey. St. Ignatius understood the revelation of scripture not as mere proof text, as though to calculate finite solutions.
Rather, revelation of truth is discovered in the midst of my imagination, allowing the Holy Spirit to couple my own experience, my own memory, my own vision, with the wisdom of scripture. Try it. Place yourself in today’s Gospel scene. Allow yourself to be Mary Magdalene, weeping in loss. And invite this truly beautiful encounter with your friend Jesus, as He asks, “Woman, why are you weeping?”
Pause, and be present to this interaction in the depths of your imagination. How would you react to this question from this yet unrecognized person? And then, as the Spirit moves, the transcendent moment: the recognition of Christ in our midst. Ignatius has us beg for this free gift Mary receives, to experience the resurrection of the Easter promise. Can you beg for this grace? As we continue our Easter celebration, can we, like Mary, beg for the grace to see more clearly the resurrected Christ in our midst, this Christ who desires to encounter us in our very life.
—Matthew Couture is the Chicago-Detroit and Wisconsin Jesuits’ provincial assistant for secondary and pre-secondary education