In Memory of Her/Known Only To God

When I was a sophomore in college, my psychology professor gave us an assignment in which we were required to write our own obituary.  At 19 or 20, the idea of death seemed pretty far off, even for me, the mortician's daughter, but I gave it a shot.  I don't remember everything I wrote, but I do know that it bore little resemblance to the way my life has actually turned out.  Stopping to think about how one might be remembered and what one's legacy might be is a pretty good exercise, but it isn't one that would have made much sense to most of the people of Jesus' day.

I recently read a post on growchristians.org called "Saints Don't Need To Be Heroes."  It was written to mark the feast of two lesser-known disciples, Philip and James, and the writer commented that she wished she knew something heroic about them until she realized that she already knew all she really needed to know about them -- they gave up everything in their familiar lives to follow Jesus.  Given that, it really didn't matter that the Bible doesn't tell us anything about them beyond that.  If Shakespeare was right that the world is a stage and we are merely players, it follows that not everyone is going to be the leading lady or the hero of the story.

All of which made me ponder the many biblical women of whom we know little, women who were disciples and apostles and faithful followers of the itinerant carpenter named Jesus.  Some of them have names we recognize:  Mary Magdalene, Salome, Joanna, Susanna, and Mary and Martha of Bethany. But others are simply  mentioned and never named:  the Samaritan woman at the well, the Syro-Phoenician woman who pleaded for her daughter, and the woman who anointed Jesus' feet and wiped them with her hair. 

This last woman is depicted in the picture above by an artist named Ivanka Demchuk.  This woman, whose name is known only to God, knelt before Jesus and broke open a very expensive container of ointment to pour over his feet.  Her lavish, extravagant, bold gesture of love earned her the criticism and scorn of some in attendance, but the response from Jesus?  He told them that she had done a beautiful thing to prepare him for burial, and he furthermore said that whenever the gospel was told, throughout the whole world, what she had done would be told "in memory of her."  If those last words sound familiar, perhaps it is because they foreshadow the Last Supper when Jesus took bread and wine and gave them to his disciples with the commandment to re-enact this act and to do so "in remembrance of me."  And even today, this woman's prodigal offering of valuable perfume is told and remembered and celebrated, and even today, Christians gather at the table to enter into the holy mystery in memory of the One who first hosted the sacred meal.

I would like to know more.  I'd love for the bravery and faithfulness and steadfast love of these mothers in the faith to be remembered along with their names.  Heaven knows, the Church needs to know and teach and rejoice that they are just as much a part of the story as the more well-known men!  But perhaps in the end, it doesn't matter so much that we don't know the back story, that we don't have a clearer picture of them.  Perhaps in the end, it is enough to know that women provided for Jesus and the others out of their own resources, that women gave their all, breaking taboos in the process, to follow him and to proclaim the gospel throughout the earth. 

And so, today, let us give thanks for the countless women of faith whose names are known only to God, for as long as the gospel is proclaimed throughout the earth, these things will be told in memory of her, and her, and her, and her.  Alleluia and Amen!