Yesterday I gave a talk.

The title had already been chosen for me: “Courage in Conflict: Saint Mary Magdalene the Myrrh-Bearer and Equal to the Apostles, and the Righteous Martyr Maria Skobtsova.” Their memory fell this week on this Monday 20/7 and this Wednesday 22/7 in the Antiochian calendar.

At first, I approached the task as I usually do. I gathered books, reread familiar passages, arranged notes and searched for a thread that might hold everything together. It seemed like another talk to prepare.

It was not.

The longer I lived with these two women, the less I found myself able to speak about them. Instead, I found myself becoming quietly unsettled by them.

Mary Magdalene remained beneath the Cross. (Matthew 27:55–56, Mark 15:40–41, and John 19:25)

How many times have I read those words without really stopping there?

Mary could not change anything. She could not shorten Christ’s suffering by a single moment. She simply remained.

Then, “while it was still dark” (John 20:1), she returned once more to the tomb, only to hear the risen Lord speak her name.

“Mary.” (John 20:16)

And then those mysterious words:

“Do not cling to Me.” (John 20:17)

For reasons I cannot fully explain, I found myself lingering there…

A few pages later I was walking the streets of occupied Paris with Mother Maria.

There was another darkness.

Another kind of Cross.

Another way of remaining.

A knock at the door.

Another frightened face.

Another meal.

Another act of mercy that no one would remember.

Someone once asked her whether she was afraid.

“I am afraid… but one must do what love requires.”

I had read that sentence many times.

This time I could not read past it.

Somewhere during this week I realised that I had been measuring courage far too easily.

It is one thing to admire the faithfulness of the saints.

It is another to recognise how little I know of such love in the ordinary circumstances of my own life.

Most likely I shall never stand beneath a literal Cross or walk voluntarily into a concentration camp.

Yet hidden Calvaries are closer than we imagine.

They lie behind the doors of ordinary homes, where love quietly bears what cannot easily be changed; where a husband or wife chooses patience once more; where parents continue to hope for a child who seems to have lost the way; where sons and daughters care faithfully for ageing parents; where forgiveness is offered again before yesterday’s wounds have fully healed.

As I was contemplating all this, another question slowly emerged.

What about my own hidden Calvary?

Not the heroic one I shall probably never be asked to carry.

The ordinary one.

The conversation that requires patience one more time.

The disappointment that asks not to become bitterness.

The neighbour who is difficult to love.

The quiet sacrifice that no one notices except God.

I realised that I had spent years admiring extraordinary acts of courage while often overlooking the countless opportunities for faithfulness hidden within an ordinary day.

Now I have begun to understand that courage is not only found in great moments.

It is found in remaining.

Remaining beside a Cross.

Remaining beside another person’s suffering.

Remaining faithful when nothing seems to change.

Remaining with Christ when He appears absent.

Remaining with another human being when every instinct whispers that it would be easier to walk away.

Perhaps this is why Mary Magdalene and Mother Maria began to dwell together in my nous.

Not because their lives resembled one another.

They did not.

One stood in a garden outside Jerusalem.

The other walked the streets of occupied Paris.

Yet both discovered that love does not retreat before fear.

Both remained.

The more I reflected on them, the more another question quietly followed me.

Mary Magdalene recognised the risen Lord when He spoke her name.

Mother Maria recognised Him in every suffering face.

Most people saw strangers.

She saw Christ.

Most people saw danger.

She saw Christ.

Most people saw burdens.

She saw Christ.

I found myself wondering how often Christ has stood before me unnoticed because I was looking for someone more extraordinary.

One of my spiritual father’s sayings has come to my mind many times since giving the talk:

“Courage is the necessary ancillary of all the virtues.”

The older I become, the truer those words seem.

Without courage, forgiveness remains only an intention.

Without courage, patience soon gives way.

Without courage, generosity stays safely within the imagination.

Every virtue eventually asks us to give something of ourselves.

Perhaps that is why courage matters so much.

Not because it makes heroes of us.

But because it allows love to become real.

…

The talk has now been given.

The questions afterwards have ended.

Life has returned to its familiar rhythm.

What has remained are two women.

I cannot help wondering whether their quiet proximity in the Antiochian calendar has something to teach me.

Not because their lives were similar.

But because each, in her own way, refused to let love retreat before fear.

Long after we have finished speaking about the saints, they continue, patiently and almost imperceptibly, to speak about us.

…

I thought I had been asked to prepare a talk.

Instead, the talk prepared me.

The talk is over.

Its questions are not.