Does one not have to wonder how Mary Magdalene, sister of Lazarus and Martha of Bethany, fell so low that she could become a “model of all penitents”? Why did things go so wrong for her in the first place? Thus, the question arises: What was St. Mary Magdalene like in her youth?
The Child Mary of Magdalum
The Scriptures are silent about Mary of Magdala’s youth, but Bl. Anne Catherine Emmerich saw her youth as part of the visions she was granted. Here is (part of) what she saw, taken from her Visions:
Magdalen, the youngest child, was very beautiful and, even in her early years, tall and well-developed like a girl of more advanced age. She was full of frivolity and seductive art. Her parents died when she was only seven years old.
At this point Mary inherits the castle of Magdalum, hence her name “Mary Magdalene”, i.e. Mary of Magdalum.
She had no great love for them [her parents] even from her earliest age, on account of their severe fasts. Even as a child, she was vain beyond expression, given to petty thefts, proud, self-willed, and a lover of pleasure. She was never faithful, but clung to whatever flattered her the most. She was, therefore, extravagant in her pity when her sensitive compassion was aroused, and kind and condescending to all that appealed to her senses by some external show. Her mother had had some share in Magdalene’s faulty education, and that sympathetic softness the child had inherited from her.
How Little Mary Magdalene Was Spoiled
Magdalene was spoiled by her mother and her nurse. They showed her off everywhere, caused her cleverness and pretty little ways to be admired, and sat much with her dressed up at the window. That window-sitting was the chief cause of her ruin. I saw her at the window and on the terraces of the house upon a magnificent seat of carpets and cushions, where she could be seen in all her splendor from the street.
Scripture is full of warnings against such a woman, “clamorous, and full of allurements, and knowing nothing at all, [sitting] at the door of her house, upon a seat, in a high place of the city” (Pro 9:13-14), and little Mary Magdalene learned these ways from very early on, it would seem. Add personal inclination and the not uncommon tendency of parents to overlook faults in their children, especially their youngest, one should not be surprised. Vanity is another word for pride. Pride is the sin of Lucifer.
Surely in her, the Lord prepared a model penitent, and her life can teach us a lot about what to avoid both in our own conduct and in the education of our daughters.
Where pride is, there also shall be reproach: but where humility is, there also is wisdom. (Pro 11:2)
Don’t know much about St. Mary Magdalene? Read more here.
Interested in more paintings of St. Mary Magdalene? Have a look here.
