Mary!

“Here is a strong woman in the full beauty of her life. A beauty made almost magical by her long upward-floating hair. Deep inside her she carries a great burden. Does she know that when she looks into the distance? Can she foresee her suffering and that of her son?

Mary is one of the most important women’s names in the Bible. The most well-known Mary is Mary the mother of Jesus. In the Catholic tradition she has become the symbol of maternal love and virginal innocence. She has also been given the role of mediator and example. An image of a ‘woman elevated above life’. But none of this can be recognized in this mature, substantial woman.

But maybe it’s about Mary Magdalene, the woman who followed Jesus and (possibly wholly wrongly) is identified with the prostitute who anointed Jesus’s feet. And is she here the pregnant woman about to give birth? Is it about her carrying Jesus for nine months? And why that passion, that suffering, why that fall?

In Mary! – with Mary, the mother, the beloved, who bears the fruit of her womb in the vulnerable nakedness of her womanhood – life is made visible in painful beauty.”