John Paul II in his general audience of Wednesday,
21 May 1997 offered several reasons for concluding that the first person to
see the resurrected Lord was His Mother, the Blessed Virgin Mary. Although
this is not what we would call a defide teaching - Catholics are free to
believe it or not - there is much spiritual fruit to be had by meditating on
this point.
“The Gospels mention various appearances of the
risen Christ, but not a meeting between Jesus and his Mother. This
silence must not lead to the conclusion that after the Resurrection
Christ did not appear to Mary; rather it invites us to seek the
reasons why the Evangelists made such a choice. ...
3. Indeed, it is legitimate to think that the Mother was probably
the first person to whom the risen Jesus appeared. Could not Mary’s
absence from the group of women who went to the tomb at dawn (cf. Mk
16:1; Mt 28:1) indicate that she had already met Jesus?”
Saint Pope John Paul II
Enemies of the Church will sometimes say that once a
person becomes a Catholic he has to check his brain at the door and just let
the Pope do the thinking for him. This could not be further from the
truth. Pope John Paul II indirectly points this out by pointing to the vast
area of theology that is not yet defined where we are free to explore deeper
insights into God’s love.
Those that deny that truth can be known are implying
that their own attempts at thinking are fruitless. Truth is to the mind
what food is to the mouth and body. At some point we are intended to chomp
down on it. The mind was made to embrace objective truth. Just as
comprehension of scientific laws enables us to go further into science,
truth in other fields such as theology enables us to think more deeply and
more profitably. A person who knows certain truths is more free, not less
so.
Does Mark 16:9 “he (Jesus) appeared first to Mary Magdalene”
preclude the possibility of an earlier apparition to the Blessed Virgin
Mary?
No! See below Objection
Answered.
We have at least six reasons for concluding that
Mary was the first to see our resurrected Lord. We have two biblical
reasons, one reason based on justice, one based on love, and there is the
historical testimony of our tradition and now John Paul II’s magisterial
teaching.
Biblical Reason #1.
Where was Jesus at before Mary Magdalene saw Him ?
Jesus has a physical body. When Mary Magdalene went
to the tomb it was empty. She went to the Apostles and He was not there.
Later, she sees Him and He says that He has not yet ascended to the Father.
John 20:17 To where or to whom had Jesus gone ? With so many prominent
individuals eliminated it doesn’t seem hard to choose between Pontius Pilate
and the Blessed Virgin Mary. Jn 21:25
Biblical Reason #2.
How do we explain Mary’s absence from the tomb on Easter morning ?
Mary, most likely a single mother at this point, was
very devoted to her only Son and she followed Him all the way to the cross,
even when most of the Apostles did not. She faithfully followed Jewish
custom. (Luke 2:21-24, 39 John 2:2-5) No doubt Mary was exhausted with
grief and probably slept a good part of the Sabbath, but after that what
else would she have been thinking about other than her only Son ? When Mary
Magdalene (Luke 24:10) went to finish anointing the body why did the Blessed
Virgin Mary not go as well ? It only makes sense if Mary had known that
Jesus was not there.
Jesus had appeared to Mary first.
Some will say that this conclusion is pure
speculation, but then all attempts to answer questions that are not
infallibly determined or defined involve speculation. One of the strengths
of by John Paul II’s position is that a person can speculate as much as they
wish and as long as they wish, but I don’t think they can arrive at another
answer that is equally plausible. No other answer really fits or solves the
above questions.
If a person has one particular piece that fits
perfectly into a puzzle and no other piece can fit and one cannot even
imagine a piece that would truly fit, then it is reasonable to conclude that
this particular piece is the correct one.
Reason 3:
An Argument of Justice.
John Paul II explains why Justice leads us to this
conclusion.
“The Gospels mention various appearances of the
risen Christ, but not a meeting between Jesus and his Mother. This
silence must not lead to the conclusion that after the Resurrection
Christ did not appear to Mary; rather it invites us to seek the reasons
why the Evangelists made such a choice.”
“ 3. … This inference would also be confirmed by the fact that the first
witnesses of the Resurrection, by Jesus’ will, were the women who had
remained faithful at the foot of the Cross and therefore were more
steadfast in faith.
Indeed, the Risen One entrusts to one of them, Mary Magdalene, the
message to be passed on to the Apostles (cf. Jn 20:17-18).”
Saint Pope John Paul II
Mary heard the hammer striking the nails as her Son was
fastened to the cross. She saw with her own eyes the lance as it pierced
His side and the water and blood that poured out onto the ground. Mary was
in perfect union with the Son in his suffering on the Cross.
She was filled
with God's grace and had complete faith in Him from the beginning. So, from an
argument based on justice we have another reason to conclude that Mary would
have been the first to share in the joy of His Resurrection.
1.
2 Corinthians 1:7 “ … knowing that as you are partakers of the sufferings, so shall you be
also of the consolation.” DRB
2.
Saint Augustine taught that the only one who held
firm the Faith in the resurrection of Christ during the three days from
Good Friday to Easter Sunday was Mary. She was the only believing member
of the Church during that triduum.
3.
[So,] what share must not the Virgin-Mother have
had in the joys of the Resurrection? We should hold it as a certain
truth that Her most sweet Jesus, after His Resurrection, consoled Her
first of all.
Frei Francisco
Reason 4:
Love Opens the Door to Understanding and Knowledge.
Hopefully we all love our own mothers. Jesus, who
is the perfect Son, loved his mother even more. Being God He perfectly
fulfilled the 4th commandment. Jesus loves everyone, but Mary
was most open and therefore she is the most perfect vessel to receive that
love. If we would want to console our own mother’s sorrow, how much more so
would Jesus.
Love
reveals what the skeptic is slow to believe.
Reason 5:
Historical Tradition
The tradition that Mary was the first to witness our
Lord’s Resurrection is not overly strong, but it is there.
A fifth-century
author named Sedulius claimed it was so.
In the ninth century, George of
Nicomedia infers from Mary's share in Our Lord's sufferings that
before all others and more than all she must have shared in the triumph
of her Son. [Or. IX, P.G., C, 1500]
Eadmer of Canterbury (c. 1060 – c. 1126,
disciple of Saint Anselm),
Liber de excellentia Virginis Mariae , Chapter 5
English paraphrase :
A focus on the Incarnation of Jesus Christ. And …
The Blessed Virgin Mary was the first to witness Jesus coming into the
world as He took on flesh by the power of the Holy Spirit. And it was
the Blessed Virgin Mary who first witnessed Jesus after He had rose from
the dead by the power of the Holy Spirit as He came in His new
resurrected flesh. (Romans 8:11)
Latin Text
Eadmer is alluding to the
principles of typology. He is not only stating that Jesus first appeared to
the BVM (Blessed Virgin Mary,)
he is also providing us with a proof.
We need only to understand
two principles.
First typology and second how Mary is the most perfected of all creatures.
It would be an insult to
Jesus if someone who was less close to Jesus and who had a greater
outpouring of God’s grace or participated more fully in the heavenly glories
than someone who was closer to Jesus Christ and His grace.
But now in the example on
Mary she is the greatest of God’s creatures because she has the fullest
co-operation and participation with God’s grace. She can point to no
creature greater than herself because no creature co-operated with Jesus
more than she did. If there was a greater participation by someone other
than BVM in the Glories of Heaven such as Jesus’ resurrection by someone
who was not as close to Jesus as was BVM that would be an insult to Jesus
Christ because He is the sole source of all grace.
Therefore, Mary had to be the
first to participate in the heavenly glory of Jesus’ resurrection.
See More Details
And St. Ignatius of Loyola (1491-1556) also
claimed it.
“The Resurrection of Christ Our Lord. His First
Apparition” …
105. Christ's apparition to Mary is not found in Scripture, but it is an
opinion prominent in a long tradition of Christian writers. It is found
in ch. 70 of the Life of Christ by Ludolph, and Ignatius may have
accepted it from him. ... Cusson lists some twenty writers
who held this opinion, including Sedulius, Paulinus of Nola, Albert the
Great, Bernardino da Siena, Maldonatus, and Pope Benedict XIV (BibThSpEx,
pp. 303-304)
(Ignatius of Loyola: The Spiritual Exercises
by Ignatius of Loyola, George E Ganss, Paramanda Divakar, Edward J.
Malastesta, Page 417.
See Ignatius of Loyola , Spiritual Exercises,
4th week, the first of 14 meditations on
the risen life of Christ.)
Pope Benedict XIV (1740-58) declared that this fact
is “based on the tradition proclaimed by ancient architectural and
liturgical monuments, starting from Jerusalem itself.”
Saint Bridget of Sweden (Revelations VI, 94)
Christus Rex
Web site has several pictures of the ruins of a Basilica in
Jerusalem that was destroyed by the Moslems in 1009 AD, and it reports how
the pilgrim Daniel visited “the chapel dedicated to Jesus’ apparition to his
mother.”
Also see
Lay Witness
Reason 6:
Magisterial Teaching
Now, with the teaching of John Paul II on Wednesday,
21 May 1997 we have that to consider. He did not claim that it was
infallibly revealed, but he did say that it was reasonable to conclude that
the Blessed Mother was the first to witness Jesus’ Resurrection and
obviously he believed it as well. See Official Vatican Web Site to verify
that.
See
John Paul II’s General Audience.
Objection Answered
Possible Objection ??
Mark 16:9-10
“Now when he rose early on the first day of the week, he appeared first to
Mary Magdalene, from whom he had cast out seven demons. She went and told
those who …”
A few will wrongly claim that Mark 16:9 “he appeared first to Mary Magdalene”
precludes the possibility of an earlier apparition to the Blessed Virgin
Mary. Is Mark 16:9 a valid proof for their claim ?
No.
Their flawed conclusion is based on the false
assumption that Mark 16:9 allows for only one interpretation. Words
can have several different meanings based on context.
Many bible exegetes have affirmed that the
wording is not conclusive as to who received the very first apparition.
The great Fr. Cornelius a’ Lapide asserts that the word first indicates not
an absolute priority, but only a relative priority.
Rupert (De divinis officiis,
vii, 25; ML, CLXX, 207), with the approval of Salmeron, Maldonatus,
and a number of other exegetes, answers the difficulty drawn from
Mark (16:9), "apparuit primo Mariae Magdalenae." He thinks that the
custom of the Roman Church in placing the station for Easter at St.
Mary Major confirms our opinion.
[Jesus Christ: His Life, His Teaching and His Work,
By Ferdinand Prat, page 415 notes. The opinion being confirmed is
that the Blessed Virgin Mary was the first to see the resurrected
Lord.
See
complete context.]
Therefore, the evangelist Mark was using the term “first” to
convey the order of events after the resurrection that he [Mark] relates.
First, Jesus appeared to Mary Magdalene, and then she went to and then she
told the good news to the Apostles. It does not speak as to what may
or may not have happened before the chain of events he describes. It
does not by necessity preclude the
possibility of an earlier apparition to Mary.
The argument that Mark 16 precludes a visit to Blessed Virgin Mary before
Magdalene is based on a supposed conclusion that is not definitive,
therefore the proof is flawed. Most of the Church fathers do not address
this issue. The ones who deny Mary was visited first base their argument on
this flawed conclusion, therefore their testimony must be dismissed as
unfounded.
So, why do Sacred
Scriptures not record this event ?
John 20:30-31 clues us in as to why this event need
not be included in Scriptures, but looking further we can see a possible
reason why the Holy Spirit would have wanted to leave this visitation out of
the Bible. Perhaps He wanted to help us attain something more valuable than
just data for our intellect. Our minds were made to wonder and meditate
about things. On the one hand we can speculate about the sordid innuendos
and accusations that our fallen world constantly throws our way, or we can
speculate about the things of God. Perhaps God wanted us to open our hearts
by getting us wonder where was Jesus when the tomb was found empty. What
would have motivated His heart ? How much love did the perfect Son have for
the perfect Mother ? Why would Mary be absent from the tomb? Did she
already know something the others did not ?
As we contemplate about Jesus we can draw much fruit
as we think about how much we each love our own mother. Maybe God intended
the answers to some questions to remain hidden until we pondered those
questions with love in our hearts because only in the context of love could
the real answers be known. Love opens heart as well as the mind to a deeper
understanding of the things of God.
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