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Catholics are accustomed to thinking of the term apostle as referring exclusively to men: the Twelve who followed Jesus and were with him at the Last Supper, as well as the Apostle Paul. But the church also considers Mary Magdalene an apostle—the “apostle to the apostles,” to be precise. So clearly, being an apostle isn’t something only men can do.
If women can be apostles, this opens a fascinating question: What about Mary, Jesus’ mother? Mary of Nazareth might not have preached Jesus’ teachings to crowds, or spread the news of his resurrection, but we see her proclaiming the glory of the Lord in the Magnificat, guiding Jesus to perform his first miracle, and sticking with him by the cross. We know she was an important part of the early church. Aside from that, she birthed Jesus, body and blood, into the world.
In this third and final installment of Glad You Asked’s three-part season finale on Mary, the hosts talk with theologian Natalia Imperatori-Lee about whether Mary the Mother of Jesus was an apostle.
Imperatori-Lee’s scholarship focuses on ecclesiology, feminist theologies, and Latino/a theologies. She has written in both academic and popular publications, on topics ranging from the church’s mistreatment of women scholars, to the perils of complementarity, to Mariology. Her most recent book, Women and the Church: From Devil’s Gateway to Discipleship (Paulist Press), is an overview of feminist theology, for the undergraduate classroom.
You can learn more about this topic, and read some of Imperatori-Lee’s work, in these links.
- Women and the Church: From Devil’s Gateway to Discipleship, by Natalia Imperatori-Lee
- Bearers of an “Idle Tale”: Women’s Authority in a Creditability Economy, by Natalia Imperatori-Lee
- “Mary, Mary, quite contrary,” by Elizabeth Johnson
- “Mary Magdalene knew she was an apostle. Why don’t we?” by Alice Camille
- “Two historians track down Jesus’ women disciples,” a U.S. Catholic interview
- “Finding leadership roles for women in the church,” by Bryan Cones
- The Beginnings of the Church, by F. J. Cwiekowski
Glad You Asked is sponsored by the Claretian Missionaries USA, a congregation of Catholic priests and brothers who live and work with the most vulnerable among us. To learn more, visit claretians.org.
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