This 9-day Novena to Saint Mary Magdalene (which begins tomorrow, July 19, 2014) comes to your e-mail directly from the South of France, Mary Magdalene country. For the next 9 days you will receive an e-mail for each day of the Novena with the Gospel reading, meditation and prayer to Saint Mary Magdalene.
La Sainte-Baume, which means “holy cave” in Provençal dialect, is the name of the Cave where Mary Magdalene spent the last thirty years of her life. The entrance to this Cave is the high arch below the tree in the center of this photo. Inside is where we Novena Tour pilgrims intend to be on Saint Mary Magdalene’s feast day – July 22, 2014.
I am here in Saint-Maximin-la-Sainte-Baume anxiously awaiting the arrival of the pilgrims who will come on the 2014 Novena Tour of PROVENCE to Saint Mary Magdalene. They arrive tomorrow at Marseille Airport where I will greet them and then drive them to Saint-Maximin-la-Sainte-Baume, the town in Provence where Mary Magdalene was buried and where her skull still remains (in the Basilique Sainte-Marie-Madeleine). After the Mass, celebrated by Bishop Dominique Rey of Fréjus-Toulon, and the late night procession through the streets of Saint-Maximin with the relic of Saint Mary Magdalene, we will stay over night in a lovely Provincial apartment.
Then we will move to Plan d’Aups for the next 7 nights—making our home the Hostellerie-de-la-Sainte-Baume. The hostellerie is run by the Dominicans and just below the forest which leads up the mountain to the Cave. The Dominicans have been guardians of Saint Mary Magdalene’s relics since 1295 and she is Co-patroness of their Order of Preachers. Our Novena Tour will focus on the life of Mary Magdalene after the Resurrection and on her companions who sailed from Palestine to Gaul (now France) in 47 AD and ended up converting all of what is now Provence. We will take day trips to many towns in Provence where Mary Magdalene and her companions lived, preached and died 2000 years ago.
Saint-Maximin-la-Sainte-Baume
La Sainte-Baume, Plan d’Aups
Marseille
Aix-en-Provence
Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer
Arles
Tarascon
Each day we will pray our Novena to Saint Mary Magdalene and invite you to join us in spirit and in prayer. The Novena prayer was written by Fr. Thomas Michelet, OP from La Sainte-Baume. Novena prayers and Gospel readings for the day will be at the end of each daily post which will arrive in your email for you to follow along. Saint Mary Magdalene is a powerful intercessor so take extra care in being specific about your special intentions for the Novena. We will be carrying a handful of special intentions and prayer requests up to her Cave on Tuesday, July 22, 2014 (her feast day), and leave them near her beautiful statue behind the main altar on the Rock of Penitence.
Maybe one day you will also come with us on a Novena Tour of PROVENCE to Saint Mary Magdalene.
Many blessings to you all…
Love in MADO,
Paula Lawlor in Saint-Maximin-la-Sainte-Baume, F R A N C E
