Best known during the Middle Ages as the prostitute who became a faithful follower of Christ, Mary Magdalen was the most beloved female saint after the Virgin Mary. Why the Magdalen became so popular, what meanings she conveyed, and how her story evolved over the centuries are the focus of this compelling exploration of late medieval religious culture. Analyzing previously unpublished sermons, Katherine Jansen uses the lens of medieval preaching to examine the mendicant friars' transformation of Mary Magdalen, a shadowy gospel figure, into an emblem of action and contemplation, a symbol of vanity and lust, a model of perfect penance, and the embodiment of hope and salvation. She draws on diverse historical sources to reveal the laity's devotion to Mary Magdalen, which departed significantly from the friars' image of the saint, signaling a major development in popular religious practice and personal piety. Finally, the author comprehensively addresses the question of the House of Anjou's alliance with the Magdalen, and illuminates the relationship between politics and sanctity in southern France and Italy. Jansen shows how perceptions of the Magdalen merged with errors and misunderstandings to shape the social, spiritual, and political agendas of the later Middle Ages. She brings to life the rich complexity of medieval culture, which condemned female sexuality and women's preaching and yet popularized the veneration of Mary Magdalen as a former prostitute chosen by Christ to be the "apostle of the apostles," the first to witness and preach the Good News of the Resurrection.

"Best known during the Middle Ages as the prostitute who became a faithful follower of Christ, Mary Magdalen was the most beloved female saint after the Virgin Mary. Why the Magdalen became so popular, what meanings she conveyed, and how her story evolved over the centuries are the focus of this compelling exploration of late medieval religious culture." "Through the lens of medieval preaching, as well as the responses of those who heard the sermons preached, Katherine Jansen brings to light previously unpublished sermons to show how and why the mendicant friars transformed Mary Magdalen, a shadowy gospel figure, into an emblem of action and contemplation, a symbol of vanity and lust, a model of perfect penance, and the embodiment of hope and salvation. Jansen also draws on a variety of historical sources - from saints' lives to patronage patterns - to examine the laity's reception of the saint. She reveals that the laity's devotion to Mary Magdalen departed in significant ways from the friars' image of the saint, signaling a major development in popular religious practice and personal piety." "The making of the Magdalen will appeal to readers of medieval history and religion, to those with an interest in the study of women, sexuality, and gender, and to those who are interested in saints throughout the ages."--Jacket.

"In Memory of Her": From History to Legend --The Mendicant Magdalen --The Vita Apostolica --The Vita Activa --The Vita Contemplativa --The Wages of Sin --"Vanity of Vanities, All Is Vanity" --"There Was a Sinner in the City" --Do Penance --The Exemplar of Perfect Penance --Responses --Responses to the Scriptural Saint --Responses to the Legendary Saint --In the Shadow of the Virgin --The House of Anjou: A Royal Response --Epilogue: "In Memory of Her": From Legend to History.

"Smart and earthy . . . richly imaginative . . . the epitome of the storyteller's art."—St. Louis Post-Dispatch, named one of "The Year's Best Books" "This amazing book could well become a classic of women's literature."—Booklist, named one of the "Year's Ten Best Fantasy Books" Young Magdalen and Jesus, brimming with youthful charm and arrogance, find each other and fall in love, forging a bond that is stronger than death. Their pleasure is overshadowed by a brilliant but unbalanced druid who knows a perilous secret about Maeve's past. The prequel to The Passion of Mary Magdalen. Now in paperback!

“Cunningham weaves Hebrew scripture, Celtic and Egyptian mythology, and early Christian legend into a nearly seamless whole, creating an unforgettable fifth gospel story in which the women most involved in Jesus’s ministry are given far more representation.”—Library Journal “This year’s must-have summer reading.”—KINK Radio “Lavish and lusty . . . Cunningham’s Celtic Magdalen is as hot in the mouth as Irish whiskey.”—Beliefnet (chosen as one of this year’s “heretical beach-books”) “Explodes off the page with its tales of love, hope, power, and redemption—book clubs looking for a great discussion, take note.”—TheBookBrothel.com

Recent discoveries of sacred texts such as the Gospel of Mary of Magdala and the Gospel of Thomas tell us that Mary Magdalene was independent, insightful, and courageousa woman so inspirational that her voice can still be heard across the ages. In Invoking Mary Magdalene, religious scholar Siobhn Houston invites you to develop your own personal relationship with one of Jesus' closest disciples, as she instructs you in a daily devotional practice of prayers, meditations, and visualizations from around the world.

Mary Magdalene is a larger figure than any text, larger than the Bible or the Church; she has taken on a life of her own. She has been portrayed as a penitent whore, a wealthy woman, Christ's wife, an adulteress, a symbol of the frailty of women and an object of veneration. And, to this day, she remains a potent and mysterious figure. In the manner of a quest, this book follows Mary Magdalene through the centuries, explores how she has been reinterpreted for every age, and examines what she herself reveals about woman and man and the divine. It seeks the real Mary Magdalene in the New Testament and in the Gnostic gospels where she is extolled as the chief disciple of Christ. It investigates how and why the Church recast her as a fallen woman, it traces her story through the Renaissance when she became a goddess of beauty and love, and it looks at Mary Magdalene as the feminist icon she has become today.

Kathy O'Beirne's earliest memories are of being battered and sexually abused. Unable to confide in anyone about the beatings she regularly received from her father or about the boys who made her play dirty games, she became withdrawn and self-destructive, leading a psychiatrist to diagnose her as 'a child with a troublesome mind'. As a result, aged only eigh,t Kathy was removed from the family home and incarcerated in a series of institutions. In the first, a reformatory school run by a holy order on behalf of the Irish State, she was raped by a visiting priest. When she tried to get help, she was transferred to a psychiatric hospital, where the abuse continued, along with the administration of large amounts of drugs and electric shock treatment. At the age of twelve, Kathy was sent to a Magdalen laundry. These notorious workhouses operated in Ireland throughout the twentieth century and during that time thousands of young girls, some orphans, some pregnant and some considered 'at risk' in the community, were forced to slave in horrendous conditions. Locked away from their families and the outside world, many of the girls were cruelly punished and sexually abused by the staff or lay visitors. Kathy fell victim to one of these predators and gave birth to baby Annie just weeks before her fourteenth birthday. The little girl had a serious bowel condition but lived to the age of ten, providing the only light in Kathy's blighted life. After all that she has suffered, Kathy has now come forward to tell her harrowing story in the hope that more will be done to help survivors of institutional abuse. She recounts her tragic experiences in unflinching detail but what is most remarkable is the strength of character that shines through such a dark tale. It is this strength that has enabled her to survive and fired her continuing struggle for justice.

After 2,000 years of flawed history, here at last is a magnificent new biography of Mary Magdalene that draws her out of the shadows of history and restores her to her rightful place of importance in Christianity. Throughout history, Mary Magdalene has been both revered and reviled, a woman who has taken on many forms—witch, whore, the incarnation of the eternal feminine, the devoted companion (and perhaps even the wife) of Jesus. In this brilliant new biography, Bruce Chilton, a renowned biblical scholar, offers the first complete and authoritative portrait of this fascinating woman. Through groundbreaking interpretations of ancient texts, Chilton shows that Mary played a central role in Jesus’ ministry and was a seminal figure in the creation of Christianity. Chilton traces the evolving images of Mary Magdalene and the legends surrounding her. He explains why, despite her prominence, the Gospels actually say so little about her and why the Catholic Church for thousands of years has sought to marginalize her importance. In a probing look at the Church’s attitudes toward women, he investigates Christian misogyny in the ancient world, including the suppression of women priests who patterned their activities on Mary’s; explores the impact of Gnostic ambivalence toward women on its depictions of Mary; and shows that these traditions still influence modern portrayals of her. Chilton’s descriptions of who Mary Magdalene was and what she did challenge the male-dominated history of Christianity familiar to most readers. Placing Mary within the traditions of Jewish female savants, Chilton presents a visionary figure who was fully immersed in the mystical teachings that shaped Jesus’ own teachings and a woman who was a religious master in her own right.