DAILY REFLECTION

Monday 22nd July

Mary Magdalene

For the last 6 years the most popular girl’s name in the UK has been Olivia closely followed by Amelia. In the time of Jesus there was no contest as to the most popular Jewish girl’s name. The evidence from burial inscriptions suggests that for the whole of the first century around a quarter of women in the region were probably called Mary. This gave the gospel writers a problem as they tried to distinguish between all the women called Mary who followed Jesus. Unfortunately, this problem got worse as time went on and perhaps the greatest victim of the muddling is Mary Magdalene, whose feast we celebrate today. We first hear of Mary Magdalene in Luke’s Gospel:

After this, Jesus travelled about from one town and village to another, proclaiming the good news of the kingdom of God. The Twelve were with him, and also some women who had been cured of evil spirits and diseases: Mary (called Magdalene) from whom seven demons had come out; Joanna the wife of Chuza, the manager of Herod’s household; Susanna; and many others. These women were helping to support them out of their own means. (Luke 8.1-3)

These women seem to have been vital to Jesus' ministry. Whenever she’s listed in the Synoptic Gospels as a member of a group of women, Mary Magdalene always appears first, indicating that she was seen as the most important. In lists of the disciples, Mary Magdalene occupies a similar position among Jesus' female followers as Simon Peter does among the male apostles. Her epithet (literally "the Magdalene") probably means that she came from Magdala a large and important town, which dominated the fishing industry on the lake, on the western shore of the Sea of Galilee.

However, ‘Magdalene’ (related to the term migdal meaning ‘tower’ in Aramaic) might not have been a reference to Mary’s hometown, but a nickname given to her by Jesus, meaning ‘towering one’, suggesting her own strength and personality, in much the same way that Jesus called Simon ‘Peter’, the Rock. In the 4th century St Jerome wrote in one of his letters: “Mary Magdalene received the epithet ‘fortified with towers’ because of her earnestness and strength of faith and was privileged to see the rising of Christ first even before the apostles”.

We’re told that Mary had been possessed by seven demons. In the first century, all sorts of physical and mental illnesses could be attributed to demons. The reference to "seven" demons may mean that Mary had to undergo seven exorcisms, with the first six being partially or wholly unsuccessful. Or it may just be symbolic, as in Jewish tradition seven represented completeness. Saying Mary was possessed by seven demons may simply mean she was totally overwhelmed by them. In either case, Mary must have had some severe psychological or emotional problems and it’s not surprising she was deeply grateful to Jesus for her healing and wanted to give something back.

As Mary supported Jesus' ministry financially, she must have been reasonably wealthy. However, the idea that she got her money from prostitution seems a classic result of muddling Marys. In Luke chapter 7, an unnamed ‘sinful’ woman gate-crashes a dinner party, to anoint Jesus’ feet and wash them with her tears. In John’s gospel Mary of Bethany, sister of Martha and Lazarus, does something very similar. Pope Gregory the Great in the 6th century decided all three were the same woman and for centuries Mary Magdalene was assumed to be the sister of Martha and a reformed prostitute-hence all the paintings of Mary Magdalene dressed in scarlet, looking voluptuously penitent. This is the version of Mary Magdalene- passionate in sin, in repentance and in devotion to Christ- that caught the imagination of artists and writers down the ages. It’s provided the ‘love interest’ in countless musicals, passion plays and films It wasn’t until 1969 that the Roman Catholic Church publicly disentangled the three women to clarify that today’s feast on 22 July is ‘only of Mary Magdalene, the first person to whom Christ appeared after his resurrection’.

All four gospels agree that Mary Magdalene, along with Mary the mother of Jesus and several other women, watched Jesus's crucifixion from a distance. She stood by him until the end and she was with the women who went early on the Sunday morning to anoint Jesus’ body and to their shock found the tomb empty. Her chance to do one last act to repay all Jesus had done for her had been snatched away.

And it’s this distraught, weeping woman that Jesus chooses to be the first witness to his resurrection (John 20:11-18). Through her tears Mary hears Jesus speak her name and utter desolation is turned into utter joy. Mary is the first person to be entrusted with proclaiming the good news that the Lord is risen indeed. Jesus chooses a woman, whose testimony counted for nothing in Jewish law, he chooses a woman whom many probably regarded as mentally unstable, to become ‘the apostle to the apostles’, to indeed become a ‘Tower of Strength’.

However broken and inadequate we may feel, Jesus speaks to us too by name, he sees what we can become in the fullness of his grace and he entrusts us to be his witnesses.

If anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new! (2 Cor 5.17) 

Revd Maggie Stirling-Troy

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Friday 19th July

Gregory Bishop of Nyssa and his sister Macrina, Deaconess

Today the Church remembers Macrina and her brother Gregory of Nyssa. Macrina is one of the most significant Christian women of the Early Church. The first-born of a family of ten, she was the elder sister of both Basil of Caesarea and Gregory of Nyssa. She was a woman of strong character, who was responsible for persuading Basil to become a priest instead of following the life of a professional rhetorician. Most of what is known about her life comes from the pen of her brother Gregory of Nyssa. Gregory records that it was Macrina who was ‘the religious conscience of the family’ and the driving force behind the family’s acceptance of asceticism. From a highly influential Cappadocian family, Macrina took over the reins of the family when her father died, moving the whole household to their country estate at Annesi. Within her estate Macrina gathered around her both the like-minded and the needy, and with the addition of former domestic slaves and other new unrelated followers, an ascetic community was formed. Consequently Macrina is regarded as one of the founders of female monasticism. Celibacy and virginity were a way of life for the community, and the decision to remain a virgin was marked by the wearing of a veil that covered both the head and the shoulders. Similarly personal poverty was a goal: Macrina is recorded as giving away her authority over her inheritance. Manual work was equated with the requirement for humility and obedience but was merely preparatory to spiritual work, and the community is recorded as practising unceasing prayer and hymn singing, both day and night. Macrina died in 379. Gregory of Nyssa composed a Dialogue on the Soul and Resurrection in which Gregory purports to describe the conversation he had with the dying Macrina whom he calls ‘the Teacher’. Even when dying, Macrina continued to live a life of sanctity, as she refused a bed, and instead chose to lie on the ground.

(from Saints on Earth -Church House Publishing)

Almighty God,

by whose grace Macrina, kindled with the fire of your love,

became a burning and a shining light in the Church:

inflame us with the same spirit of discipline and love,

that we may ever walk before you as children of light;

through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,

who is alive and reigns with you,

in the unity of the Holy Spirit,

one God, now and for ever.

Amen

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Thursday 18th July

Last Wednesday I was privileged to attend a special Evensong in the Cathedral followed by a celebration supper to mark 30 years of ordination of women to the priesthood in the Church of England. Although women had an active leadership role and ministry in the early church, from at least the fourth century onwards there was no question of women’s ordination to clerical roles. Women with a sense of vocation generally exercised their ministry within religious institutions.

The Lutherans became the first denomination to revive the order of deaconesses, a deaconess institution being founded at Kaiserwerth by Pastor T. Fliedner in 1836. Elizabeth Ferard was descended from an old Huguenot family and had been awaiting an appropriate opportunity to serve God in the Church of England. At that time the Oxford Movement was seeing a revival of Anglo-Catholic religious orders in the Anglican Communion but Elizabeth had strongly Protestant views. After the death of her mother in 1858 she went to Germany to stay for several months in the Kaiserwerth institution. She worked in the orphan house, learned nursing skills and commented, ‘I again heard of the continual spreading of the Deaconess work in every direction except in England, and more than ever wished we could have something of the kind in England, where the materials for it are so abundant, could we but found a Deaconess House on the right principles without falling on the stumbling block of Romanism.’

Returning to England, Elizabeth was to demonstrate that she had the singleness of purpose and strength of mind to put her vision into practice. She initially worked for a short time with the Community of All Hallows at Ditchingham in Suffolk. Then, in 1861, she took the step of faith and offered herself to begin the deaconess order in England. She and two other like-minded women began the Community of St Andrew at a house in Burton Crescent, King’s Cross under a common rule of life dedicated to worship and to works of mercy. On St Andrew’s Day 1861 the Community merged (though kept its own identity) with the new Deaconesses’ Institution and the following July Bishop Tait of London admitted Elizabeth as the first deaconess in the Church of England. The new order began to flourish as more dioceses began to admit women to the order, though some disliked the concept of sisterhoods and preferred the parochial model pioneered by Isabella Gilmore in Rochester diocese. The growth of the work in London resulted in a move from King’s Cross to larger premises in Westbourne Park. The same year Elizabeth’s health failed and she resigned her leadership role. But she lived for a further ten years, dying on Easter Sunday 1883.

(Some material taken from Saints on Earth -Church House Publishing)

From about 1887 the Community evolved into a Religious Community known as the Deaconess Community of St Andrew with a dual vocation of life commitment in community and ordained ministry in the Church. In 1987, four Sisters of the Deaconess Community of St Andrew were amongst the first women to be ordained Deacon at Bristol and seven Sisters at London. In 1994, three of those Deacons were ordained as Priests and the community ceased to admit new members. Its work was done.

Prayer

Almighty God, you have surrounded us with a great cloud of witnesses: Grant that we, encouraged by the good example of your servant Elizabeth Ferard, may persevere in running the race that is set before us, until at last we may with her attain to your eternal joy; through Jesus Christ, the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
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Wednesday 17th July

Isaac Watts was born in Southampton on 17 July 1674, the son of a non-conformist minister. As a baby he was nursed on the steps of the Southampton jail where his father was imprisoned as a dissenter. This was before the Toleration Act of 1689 made the establishment of non-conformist places of worship legally possible. His father began tutoring Isaac in Latin when he was only four. By the time he was seven he was writing poetry like this:

I am a vile polluted lump of earth,S o I've continued ever since my birth,A lthough Jehovah grace does daily give me,A s sure this monster Satan will deceive me,C ome therefore, Lord from Satan's claws relieve me.W ash me in thy blood, O Christ,A nd grace divine impart,T hen search and try the corners of my heart,T hat I in all things may be fit to doS ervice to thee, and sing thy praises too.

After grammar school in Southampton, where he also learnt Greek and Hebrew, he refused scholarships to Oxbridge because in those days that meant becoming a member of the Church of England. Instead he went to the leading Dissenting Academy in Stoke Newington. On finishing there at the age of 20, he returned home to Southampton, where he spent another two years in private study before finding work as tutor to the son of a fellow dissenter Sir John Hartopp.

After 5 years he became assistant minister at one of the most prominent London nonconformist chapels, the Mark Lane Meeting, and was appointed senior minister in 1702. He was a good preacher and conscientious pastor, building up the congregation, but at enormous personal cost. His health was frail; he was obliged to take prolonged breaks at Bath to re-gain his energy; and in 1713 he suffered a complete nervous breakdown and had to retire at the age of 39. It was clear that, despite all his gifts, his constitution wasn't suited to church ministry.

He was rescued by a kind landowner, Sir Thomas Abney, who invited him to stay for a week and ended up effectively giving him a home for life. As a permanent houseguest of the Abneys, Watts was able to do what he did best, which was to write. He had wide interests, writing leading textbooks on logic, psychology, the English language and the education of children, as well as verses for children to read. ‘How doth the little crocodile’ in “Alice in Wonderland” was a parody of Isaac Watts’ “How doth the little busy bee”, a poem that generations of children in the 18th and 19th centuries had to learn by heart.

But his overwhelming achievement was his hymn writing. It’s difficult to overestimate how important Isaac Watts was in creating a whole new genre-the English hymn. Instead of literally following the scriptural texts he argued that psalms needed to be ‘Christianized’ to make them relevant for a New Testament faith and that Christians should write their own devotional songs based on scripture but not tied to the Psalms.

The new genre was enormously popular, helping people encounter God in worship in a completely new way. Tens of thousands of hymns (of admittedly varying quality) were written in the following centuries. But many of Watts’ hymns also had real literary merit and influenced later poets like William Blake and Emily Dickinson. He wrote hundreds of hymns including ‘O God our help in ages past’, ‘Joy to the world’ and ‘Jesus shall reign where’er the sun’ but perhaps the greatest one of all is this:

When I Survey the Wondrous Cross (youtube.com)
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Tuesday 16th July

20 Then he began to reproach the cities in which most of his deeds of power had been done, because they did not repent. 21 ‘Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the deeds of power done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. 22 But I tell you, on the day of judgement it will be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon than for you. 23 And you, Capernaum, 'will you be exalted to heaven? No, you will be brought down to Hades'. For if the deeds of power done in you had been done in Sodom, it would have remained until this day. 24 But I tell you that on the day of judgement it will be more tolerable for the land of Sodom than for you.’ (Matthew 11.20-24)

Reflection

These verses hint at the mass of unrecorded history that the Gospels omit: the deeds of power performed by Jesus in the towns at the northern end of the Sea of Tiberias. Here were communities that listened to Jesus, and saw his miracles, but shrugged their shoulders and sent him on his way.

We take time to notice what “deeds of power” God has done in us. As we ask God to open our eyes and to help us to grow in gratitude, we pray that we may not miss what God has done, is doing, and wants to do.

Again and again, Jesus asks us to stay alert, to notice, to listen. I invite the Holy Spirit to help me now to look at my life and grow in appreciation and gratitude. I give thanks for those who have brought me good news, for everything that leads me to life. (Based on reflections from Sacred Space https://sacredspace.com )

Prayer

Thanks be to thee, my Lord Jesus Christ, for all the benefits thou hast given me, for all the pains and insults thou hast borne for me. O most merciful redeemer, friend and brother, may I know thee more clearly, love thee more dearly, and follow thee more nearly, day by day. Amen. (Prayer of Richard of Chichester)
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