Daily Gospel Reflection
Join the Notre Dame family of faith. Receive God’s Word and a unique reflection in your inbox each day.
April 14, 2020
Mary Magdalene stood weeping outside the tomb. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb; and she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had been lying, one at the head and the other at the feet.
They said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping?” She said to them, “They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.”
When she had said this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not know that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you looking for?”
Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.”
Jesus said to her, “Mary!”
She turned and said to him in Hebrew, “Rabbouni!” (which means Teacher).
Jesus said to her, “Do not hold on to me, because I have not yet ascended to the Father. But go to my brothers and say to them, ‘I am ascending 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 she told them that he had said these things to her.
Mary of Magdala has been up since the crack of dawn and has seen that the tomb is empty. The other disciples have already come and gone–except for Mary. She’s devastated; Jesus was sent to an untimely and unjust death, and now his body is gone? That is all she thought she had left of him. She stays because she isn’t finished weeping yet.
Understandably, Mary cannot imagine the resurrection. Even in the presence of angels, she still wants them to tell her where his body is. She is so deep in her mourning that she doesn’t recognize Christ in front of her until he calls her name. Sometimes we are in such grief that we can’t function, we can’t see outside the suffering, and we aren’t open to experiencing the Risen Christ.
The coronavirus has made this Easter season one for the books. To be honest, it’s been difficult for me to scrape together much enthusiasm or joyfulness in my prayer. Many of us already struggle to carry the daily ache and weariness of loss, and now a pandemic has turned the world upside down. Like Mary, a lot of us are not finished weeping.
But the gospel today gives us solace, reminding us that we have a God who knows us, calls us by name, and is strong enough to hold our grief. Mary responds to Jesus with only one word: Rabbouni, meaning “teacher.” With that, Mary opens herself to the love of the Risen Christ, who expands her imagination, plants a seed of hope, and transforms her sorrow into wonder at the power of God.
How can all of us attempt to recognize and respond to Christ in all of Christ’s (often surprising) movements in our lives? How can we, like Mary, allow the hope of Easter to transform our suffering?
Prayer
Lord Jesus, by appearing to her as risen and uttering her name, you transformed Mary Magdalene’s grief and sent her to proclaim the news that you were alive. Help us to hear you tenderly speak our names, so that we may know your living presence, and also know ourselves made new by the resurrection. You live and reign with the Father and Spirit, God forever and ever. Amen.
Saint of the Day
Though he was just a poor shepherd boy, St. Bénézet was responsible for a huge public work—the building of a massive bridge.
Bénézet grew up in southeastern France in the middle ages watching his mother’s sheep. He was thoughtful and pious, and seems to have reflected upon the dangers faced by those who wanted to cross the Rhône river.
One day, during a solar eclipse, Bénézet heard a voice that told him to build a bridge over the river at Avignon, a place where the current flowed strong and rapid.
At the time, the building and care of bridges was considered a magnificent public work, and the wealthy often provided for bridges in their wills. Bénézet was an uneducated, poor boy, but he obeyed the voice he had heard.
He traveled to Avignon and addressed the bishop in that city to tell him of his mission. The bishop did not take him seriously, of course, and legend has it that the boy miraculously carried a huge stone himself to begin the foundation.
Soon Bénézet gathered much attention because of miracles attributed to him: blind people could see, disabled people walked, deaf people could hear again. The bishop and civil authorities granted him power to oversee the construction of the bridge, which began in 1177.
Bénézet supervised construction for seven years before he died—by that time the bulk of the difficult work had been accomplished. A chapel was built into the bridge itself and Bénézet’s body was buried there. It lay there for some 500 years until a flood washed part of the bridge away. His tomb was recovered and it was discovered that his body had not decayed; it was moved to a monastery for veneration. What remains today of the Pont Saint-Bénézet is shown here; it is still a pilgrimage site.
In 1189, the Order of Bridge Brothers was established as a society of wealthy sponsors who provided for the construction and maintenance of bridges, and they adopted St. Bénézet as their patron. He remains the patron saint of those who build bridges, and also of bachelors.
St. Bénézet, you were the poor shepherd boy who followed a call to build a massive bridge—pray for us!
Image Credit: Our featured image of St. Bénézet is available for use under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported. Last accessed February 21, 2025 on Wikimedia Commons.
