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Friday of the Twenty-fourth week in Ordinary Time

Commentary of the day
Blessed John-Paul II, Pope from 1978 to 2005
Speech of 29/04/1979 (trans. © copyright Libreria Editrice Vaticana)

"Accompanying him were the Twelve and some women"

It is particularly moving to meditate on the attitude of Jesus to woman. He showed himself to be bold and surprising for those times in which woman was considered in paganism an object of pleasure, of possession and of labor, and was subordinated and humiliated in Judaism. Jesus always showed the greatest esteem and the greatest respect for woman, for every woman, and in particular he was sensitive to female suffering. Going beyond the religious and social barriers of the time, Jesus re-established woman in her full dignity as a human person before God and before men.

How could we fail to recall his meetings with Martha and Mary (Lk 10:38-42), with the Samaritan women (Jn 4:1-42), with the widow of Naim (Lk 7:11-17), with the adulterous woman (Jn 8:3-9), with the woman who suffered from a haemorrhage (Mt 9:20-22), with the sinner at the house of Simon the Pharisee (Lk 7:36-50)? A mere enumeration of them stirs our hearts. And how could we fail to recall, above all, that Jesus willed to associate some women with the Twelve (Lk 8:2-3)? They accompanied him and served him, and were of comfort to him during the painful way to the Cross. And after the resurrection Jesus appeared to the holy women and to Mary Magdalen, bidding her announce his Resurrection to the disciples (Mt 28:8). Jesus, wishing to become incarnate and enter our human history, willed to have a Mother, Mary, and thus raised woman to the highest and most wonderful peak of dignity, the Mother of God Incarnate, Mary Immaculate, Our Lady of the Assumption, Queen of Heaven and of Earth.

Therefore, you Christian women, like Mary Magdalen and the other women of the Gospel, must proclaim, testify that Christ really rose again, that he is our only true consolation! So look after your interior life of meditation and prayer.