Today’s Gospel reading offers us a glimpse into the life of some of the Lord’s disciples who often fade into the background, but who nevertheless played a unique and important role in Jesus’s life and ministry: the women Mary, called Magdalene, from whom seven demons had gone out, Joanna, the wife of Herod’s steward Chuza, Susanna, and many others who accompanied Jesus and the Twelve and provided for them out of their resources. It is these women who made the itinerant ministry of Jesus possible on a practical level. Moreover, in their faithfulness they exceed the apostles, for Luke reports none of the Twelve at the foot of the cross, whereas he does note the presence of the women who had come from Galilee with him.
The faithfulness of our Lord’s women disciples is no less relevant to today’s feast: among today’s group of 103 Korean martyrs, there are no less than forty-five women who gave their lives in witness to Christ. It is worth imagining the roles that these catechists, virgins, widows, mothers, and other women played in the young Korean Church, building it up and ultimately watering the tree of faith with their own blood. It is God alone who knows the true fruitfulness of each.
With today’s Gospel and feast in mind, then, let us contemplate the many women who have borne witness to Christ throughout the ages, asking that we might share in their virtues of fidelity, love, and service to others.