May 30

Thursday of the First Week after Easter

Faith worketh by love. Galatians 5:6.

IN that great penitent, S. Mary Magdalene, our Lord bears witness that in her there were together love and faith; and for both together, a loving faith, or a "faith working by love," our Lord tells her, "thy sins are forgiven." Truly, she had great faith, who knows and believed the Physician of her soul, and knew that "the Son of Man had power on earth to forgive sins," and could read her heart, and knew what she was, what she longed to be, what she came for; would not disdain her, would accept her love, that she might kiss His Feet, and that when she washed them with her tears, He would wash away her sins. She had great faith. Our Lord speaks first of love, "Her sins are forgiven her, because she loved much." She must have loved much, when she poured out her tears with the ointment upon His sacred Feet. She knew Him Whom the self-righteous Pharisee knew not. She knew the depth of the loathsomeness of her own sin, for she loathed it in herself, but she knew what the Pharisee knew not, Who He was Whom she touched. She knew that holiness came from His touch to her. Think you not that those hot burning tears which dimmed her eyes and washed her Saviour's Feet were tears of burning love? Could she but love when she kissed the Feet of God, wearied in seeking her, the lost one? He despised not her polluted lips, but rather "virtue went out of Him" to cleanse them.

O God of our salvation, Lord Of wondrous power and love! May faith, salvation's holy seed, Be sent us from above.