'True Love: A Woman's Authority': Sermon from March 6, 2016

Gospel of Mary, Chapter10

Andrew responded, addressing the brothers and sisters, "Say what you will about the things she has said, but I do not believe that the S[a]vior said these things, f[or] indeed these teachings are strange ideas."
     Peter responded, bringing up similar concerns. He questioned them about the Savior: "Did he, then, speak with a woman in private without our knowing about it? Are we to turn around and listen to her? Did he choose her over us?"
     Then [M]ary wept and said to Peter, "My brother Peter, what are you imagining? Do you think that I have thought up these things by myself in my heart or that I am telling lies about the Savior?"
Levi answered, speaking to Peter, "Peter, you have always been a wrathful person. Now I see you contending against the woman like the Adversaries. For if the Savior made her worthy, who are you then for your part to reject her? Assuredly the Savior's knowledge of her is completely reliable. That is why he loved her more than us.
     "Rather we should be ashamed. We should clothe ourselves with the perfect Human, acquire it for ourselves as he commanded us, and announce the good news, not laying down any other rule or law that differs from what the Savior said."
     After [he had said these] things, they started going out [to] teach and to preach.

So I just celebrated a birthday last week, and I have question for you… How old you think I am?  Not something you are usually allowed to ask, right?  Most women hate the onset of age, and we like to pretend we are 29 for decades. But in some ways I look forward to it.  See, I have spent most of my career in politics and community organizing. My first job was working in the office for the first Democrat ever elected in a solidly Republican county in Illinois, and I would sometimes represent him at events.  Then, I transitioned into community organizing and advocating for just policies – first with health care reform, then with immigration, and now often with public investment and public health. I’ve had a career of trying to bring to light issues of injustice for those who are invisible, to bring more compassion into the spaces where our systems have failed.

As you can imagine, I’ve spoken a lot to not entirely friendly audiences, trying to convince them that hopeful things are possible and necessary. And I’ve done this as a young woman, with a youngish face – and worse yet - FRECKLES.  (Most people lose their freckles when they leave adolescence, and I prayed for that moment…but no, not for me.)  So, as a freckled young faced political person, there is a part of me that welcomes this march of age with the eagerness that maybe some crows feet will add to my authority. Because I’ve had too many experiences of people patting me on the head, congratulating me for my passion, and sending me on my way without taking me seriously. 

Reading today’s scripture, I understood the frustration that made Mary Magdalene weep when contradicted by Peter. This passage sadly echoes the most important and consistent reference to Mary Magdalene that we have from the traditional New Testament.  In every gospel, Mary of Magdalene is acknowledged as the first at the tomb and the first to witness the resurrection.  In every gospel, Mary hastens to tell the male disciples, who regard her testimony with disbelief.  They are in disbelief both at the events, and because the interaction was in private, with a woman. 

Somehow, the word of a woman was not equal to the word of a man.  Is not equal to that of a man.  Two thousand years later, there are still far too many instances of being called ‘passionate’ instead of ‘authoritative.’ 

Passion, to me, denotes love. The Gospel of Mary mentions passion that has no likeness and is contrary to nature. Pastor Damien talked about our passion as that which goes beyond our typical human nature – our passion for our soul mates, our passion for knowledge, our passion that drives us to have a deeper understanding of the universe. In these ways, I see passion as the outward expression of love. Webster’s dictionary defines passion as ‘a strong and barely controllable emotion.’

But the root of passion originates from the Latin, ‘pati’, meaning to suffer. This is where get the Passion of the Christ, relating to the 40 days in the Wilderness and suffering during his last week. By this etymology, to have com/passion is to suffer with another person.  To me, this is still an expression of love.  When we suffer, it is often because we love something dearly.  Like a mother watching a child go through rejection … or the adult child feeling powerless to help their aging parent hold onto their coordination … or that spouse trying to be supportive to a partner going through job loss … a passion for good, for change, for advocacy arises from this place of love. 

Is this not the story of our Mary of Magdala? Was she not there in compassion at the foot of the cross, standing vigil in her grief at the tomb, and through her devastation, still there to collect Jesus’ body at the tomb?  No one can deny that Mary Magdalene loved Jesus.  And it is through this love, this passion, that Mary derives her authority.  

As a community organizer, we often talk about the transformative power of personal stories. In advocating in the public sphere for better policies, no tool is as important as the personal story.  Experts can be found to support all points of view.  Data can be manipulated and twisted.  Only your personal story cannot be disputed.  When you’ve overturned every stone, investigated every option for health insurance, bent over backward for coverage and still you remain uninsured because of something in your health history, (for example), your witness is more powerful than any report… It is truth.  No one can claim more authority over your personal experience than you.

These stories are key in community organizing…but I’ve also seen them be transformative for women when those women realize, for the first time, that their personal story matters.  That their personal story gives them authority.  That their personal story can make change.  While the historic church and society has long denied women authority in institutions of power, female authority is clear when it arises from a place of love, and never more so than when it relates to the arenas that have been typically relegated as ‘women’s work’: ...with children, with family, as caretakers, and for ourselves.  History shows us that women who, motivated by love, build on that authority of caring and compassion often move mountains and impact wider populations through their personal story.

I am reminded of Representative Jan Schakowsky, an Illinois Congressperson I have the privilege to know who is one of the liberal lions in DC.  Jan began her public life in 1969 when, as a housewife with 2 young kids, she was worried about buying a rancid package of pepper steak.  She asked the butcher about the age of the steak, but the butcher didn’t take her seriously. He said if she had a problem with it, she could shop somewhere else. One week later, she heard another mother complaining about the same thing. They joined forces to fight the grocery store, and through smarts, determination, and chutzpah, their public campaign was the reason we have expiration dates on our meat today. 

I’m reminded of Alice Tregay, a late civil rights activist in Chicago, one of the thousands of nameless advocates that put their lives on the line with Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.  My friend Alice, an African American woman, paired up with another Alice, who was white, and coordinated visits to Chicago real estate offices in the 60’s.  They documented how each family, similar in economic status and differing only in race, was shown homes in completely different neighborhoods.  Black Alice and White Alice used their lived experience to expose illegal red-lining policies in place all throughout the city of Chicago, responsible for keeping black families in dilapidated parts of the city and allowing white flight.

And I’m reminded of Dr. Mona Hanna-Attisha, the scientist who uncovered the lead levels in Flint’s water supply.  After over a year of residents’ complaints, state officials still rejected a September report showing elevated lead levels.  So Dr. Mona did some research, and then something unorthodox. In her words, “we shared [our] results at a press conference, and you don’t usually share research at press conferences. It’s supposed to be shared in published medical journals, which now it is. But we had an ethical, moral, professional responsibility to alert our community about this crisis, this emergency.” Following this, Dr. Mona was attacked in the press, called “an unfortunate researcher” and blamed for inciting mass hysteria.  But she persevered, and in the end, her determination halted widespread poisoning. 

Regardless of how often people try to discredit this type of authority, it perseveres because it holds inherent truth borne of experience and of compassion. If any of these women had quit loving their children, their neighbors, their race or their communities because someone doubted their authority, we would be in a very different place.  But they have a wonderful example in Mary of Magdalene, a wealthy woman who was closer to Jesus than any other disciple.  She loved him fiercely, and in doing so, witnessed something transformative.  She had an encounter with the resurrected Jesus that shook her down to her soul.  She went and testified to that good news to the Apostles, despite the backlash that could be expected. She knew her story mattered.

In the Secret Lives of Bees, Sue Monk Kidd writes about a young white girl who is hiding out with her black Nanny and 3 other African American women who make honey for a company called ‘Black Madonna’.  And even though this dialogue refers to a different Mary from scripture, she pulls on the same authority rooted in love:

”When you’re unsure of yourself,” August said, “when you start pulling back into doubt and small living, she [Mary] is the one inside you saying, ‘Get up from there and live like the glorious girl you are.’ She’s the power inside you, you understand?”

“And whatever it is that keeps widening your heart, that’s Mary, too, not only the power inside you but the love. And when you get down to it, Lily, that’s the only purpose grand enough for a human life. Not just to love – but to persist in love.”

Thanks to the persistence of Mary of Magdala, the Apostle to the Apostles, we all have the opportunity to be transformed for a grand purpose.  

We all have this core authority to speak from love – male or female or neither, child or adult or neither, wealthy, poor, minority or majority.  When we speak from a place of authentic knowledge of those we love, of their lives or their sufferings, that power cannot be denied. Imagine the impact you might have if you were as determined as Mary Magdalene to use your authority to testify to ‘the Good’. How does your story matter?  How would our world be transformed if we all persisted in love?

I leave you with that passionate question.

Amen.