blessed” Calvary. Christ on the cross, Mary and John on either side Mary of Magdala crouched at the foot of the cross. The three people who mattered most to him.
What happened to them? John presumably fulfilled his promise to look after the Mother. But the Scriptures have no mention of her on Easter morning.
The other two play key roles. It’s Mary Magdalen who goes early to the tomb and is shocked to find it empty. When Peter and John were summoned and John entered the tomb, “he saw and he believed”.
What Mary of Magdala saw was not an emptiness but a vision of angels. And then she was the first to see Him, through her tears, silhouetted against the low radiance of the early morning sun, not recognising Him until he spoke her name.
The Risen Lord. Did they later meet again? History is silent – real history, that is, not the weird speculations of those who wish to cast Mary Magdalen as the one who could “crumble the Church”.
Scriptures tells us little more about Mother Mary. One brief glimpse of her in the Upper Room in Jerusalem (Acts 1:14). History suggests she retired eventually to Ephesus, maybe for many years. The rest is theology. When she came to die, she was assumed into heaven.
Could Mother and Son communicate between his Ascension and her Assumption? I don’t mean séances or even wishful thinking. Normally between those in heaven and those on earth there is only one channel of communication: heart to heart. I mean that undying essence of love between two individuals, using a language far too deep for words. The unspoken language which linked the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the Immaculate Heart of Mary – even during that period of her life when He had ascended into heaven and she was being looked after by the disciple He loved.
They communicated heart to heart. Cor ad cor. And finally the time came for her to die. Jesus came to meet her, opening His heart to her, assuming her into His eternal presence. Mother of the Word incarnate.