Gospel (Jn 20,1-2.11-18) - On the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene went to the tomb in the morning, while it was still dark, and she saw that the stone had been removed from the tomb. She then ran and went to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one Jesus loved, and said to them: "They have taken the Lord away from the tomb and we don't know where they have put him!". Mary was outside, near the tomb, and was crying. While she was crying, she bent down towards the tomb and saw two angels in white robes, one sitting at the head and the other at the feet, where the body of Jesus had been placed. And they said to her: «Woman, why are you crying? ?". She replied to them: "They have taken away my Lord and I do not know where they have placed him." Having said this, she turned back and saw Jesus, standing; but she didn't know it was Jesus. She said Jesus to her: «Woman, why are you crying? Who are you looking for?". She, thinking that he was the guardian of the garden, said to him: "Lord, if you took him away, tell me where you put him and I will go and get him." Jesus said to her: «Mary!». She turned and said to him in Hebrew, “Rabboni!” —which means: «Master!». Jesus said to her: «Do not hold me back, because I have not yet ascended to the Father; but go to my brothers and say to them: 'I ascend to my Father and your Father, my God and your God'". Mary Magdalene went to announce to her disciples: "I have seen the Lord!" and what she had told her.

The commentary on the Gospel by Monsignor Vincenzo Paglia

Today the liturgy commemorates Mary Magdalene, who met Jesus at the beginning of his mission in Galilee and was freed from "seven demons". The Gospel presents her to us while she stands next to the empty tomb and she cries. It is not easy to remain next to a tomb, that is, next to great suffering. But this is the strength of the love that binds Mary of Magdala to her master. «Woman, why are you crying?» the angels ask, as Jesus himself will later do. And Mary's tears speak to us of a great love, of a revolt against death, and that there is no true resurrection if we do not ultimately go through those tears and that question: "Why are you crying?". And that question addressed to Mary of Magdala today resonates in front of many tombs and places of pain: from the places wounded by war, in Ukraine and in many other places in the world, to the pain of those who feel alone in the face of the difficulties and problems of life . What are you looking for? How many are looking for peace, future, friendship, meaning in their lives. Jesus was all of this for Mary. And Mary then, whom the church defines as the Apostle of the Apostles, becomes for us a model of disciple and apostle. She is a disciple because she has learned from her "master" who is Jesus (as she calls him), the compassion that does not give up, and her tears in front of the empty tomb recall the tears of Jesus himself in front of the tomb of Lazarus. Apostle because in the encounter with the risen Jesus Mary today helps us to live like a passage, an Easter, from the garden of Gethsemane, to the garden of the resurrection, the sadness that changes into joy. It is a transformation that this world needs, many places tell us this that remain empty of hope that we do not forget precisely because like Mary we are called to bring this hope where it is missing, we too are disciples of this love of the Lord who forgets no one .