by Monica Sanchez, St. Mary's College of California

I enrolled in a class about Mary Magdalene with the intent of honing an encyclopedic knowledge about a biblical figure. Meaning, it was not my yearning heart that urged me to register, but my gluttonous intellectual curiosity. As a lapsed Catholic (and still a teenager! Is that a record?) I did not think this course had the capacity to win my love. I was mistaken. Not only has my religious intrigue been renewed - complete with gut-wrenching pangs of devotion, but the class is powerful enough to induce tender musings of convent life in the head of any sorry soul.

Before his crucifixion Jesus had an entourage of hand-picked pupils. These students are better known as the Apostles. There was only one woman is his close-knit boys’ club. Her name was Mary Magdalene. She was not a repenting prostitute as virtually all Hollywood movies and real-life religious leaders allow us to believe. In truth, Mary Magdalene was Jesus’ right hand. She was the Apostle to the Apostles.

When Mary Magdalene went to anoint her dead teacher’s body she was met by his empty tomb. Grave robbers, it seemed, had victimized her savior. She keeled over sobbing. Two angels asked her why she was sobbing. She cried, “I don’t know where they have taken my Lord.” A figure then approached her, appearing to be a gardener who maintained the burial grounds. He said, “Woman, why are you weeping?” Mary asked him where her teacher’s body had been taken. “Mary!” responded the figure. Recognizing his call at once, she turned to her ‘gardener,’ saying, “My teacher!” She reached out to him, to make sure he was indeed real. He would not permit her touch, telling her instead to merely believe what she saw. He then made her his very first evangelist, saying, “Tell my disciples I am alive and am going to ascend to my father and your father, to my God and your God.”

This scene has been portrayed for centuries in art. Always these pieces are titled in the Latin, "Noli me tangere," meaning, "Don't touch me." That phrase sums up the beauty of the scene. It is because Mary Magdalene obeys her teacher and does not touch him that she makes up for Eve's sin. Mary Magdalene listened to her educator when he said to only trust that her eyes were not deceiving her, without pawing him. Eve refused to obey God when he told her to not touch the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. Eve not only failed, but she went as far as to eat from the cursed tree. How ironic that such an off-putting phrase encompasses the beauty of pure love and trust. "Noli me tangere."

I've made a good friend at college. His name is Ben. Recently he asked me if I'd go out with him. I'd rather not only because it would complicate the friendship. I do love him, though. As a friend, strictly speaking. At times when we are alone and he reaches for my hand I'd like to say him, "Noli me tangere, pal." But, such a sentiment is only beautiful and loving when said by Jesus on Easter to his weeping Mary of Magdala.

"Noli me tangere" aside, Mary Magdalene’s teacher was alive! Is that what chokes me up – the fact that her beloved educator, her best friend, her savior – had risen from the dead and had chosen to appear to her, a female pupil, before any other? In part, yes. But, more than that, my emotions surface with this story because after her teacher had been taken from her and his in-person teachings came to an end due to humanity’s misery, the two were reunited and life’s perfection was restored.

Long live passionate learners and their powerful learned.