#bad list

Every age has its mistakes.

One of the big mistakes of our age? Black and white thinking. The false assumption that something, or someone, has to be either all one thing or all the other. As if there were only two, mutually exclusive options. And nothing else was even possible.

Sometimes it’s easy to spot. Like in toxic workplaces. And toxic families.

Either you’re either on the good list. And can do no wrong. Or you’re on the bad list. And can do no right.

What’s harder to spot is when you and I internalize that false assumption. And assume that we can only be one thing or the other.

One of the common ways this plays out in our thinking? With doubt. The notion that if we have any questions, any doubt at all, then we can’t believe in something. And therefore, must totally reject it.

The idea that we could love something, or someone, and still have doubts?

We don’t know what to do with that. We can say the words. But the idea? It is so foreign to us, that it just doesn’t stick.

Which is why we struggle to understand Mary Magdalene’s actions in today’s Gospel. She sees Jesus, she talks to Jesus, but she doesn’t recognize Jesus. Not at first.

This makes no sense to us. How could someone who loves Jesus not recognize Jesus?

If you’ve ever wanted to see how bizarre speculation about stuff in the Bible can get, today’s Gospel is an absolute goldmine. And it’s all because of our black and white thinking.

If you’re not locked into black and white thinking, the truth of the matter is actually pretty simple. And something that we all do, but don’t admit to ourselves that we do.

Mary Magdalene loved and doubted.

The truth is, Mary is just like us. We might like to pretend that we’re all one thing and not the other. But none of us really are that way. All of us are a mixed bag.

This was common knowledge in the early centuries of the Church. Speaking about Mary Magdalene, Pope Gregory the Great put it this way,

“Because she loved and doubted, she saw Him and did not recognize Him. Her doubt prevented her from knowing Him, and her love revealed Him to her.”

Nowhere does it say that Jesus removed all of Mary Magdalene’s doubts. Or that she had perfect faith. Mary Magdalene loved and doubted.

You want to know why, in the end, Mary Magdalene was able to recognize Jesus?

Because she didn’t let her doubts run away with her. She didn’t fall for the nonsense that one drop of doubt somehow cancels an ocean of love.

Mary Magdalene kept on loving, even though she doubted. And in the end, it was that love, in the face of doubt, that carried her to Jesus.

Mary Magdalene’s lesson for us is something that you and I cannot hear enough in this age of black and white thinking.

You can love and doubt.

God won’t love you any less.

It’s okay to doubt. But don’t let it keep you from loving God.