The Forgotten Hero of Christ’s Passion
Mary of Bethany broke open a jar worth a year’s wages and poured it over Jesus's feet. Judas reached for the ledger. Jesus defended her. Holy Week begins with a question about what love costs.
Dear friends,
Letters from Leo is publishing daily Lenten reflections through Easter, available exclusively to paid subscribers.
Each day during Lent, I’m sharing a short meditation rooted in the day’s scripture readings. These reflections are my most personal writing: vulnerable, searching, and grounded in the conviction that repentance, renewal, and resolve are not abstract concepts but daily choices.
They are an invitation to confront our idols, sit with discomfort, and let the liturgical season do its quiet, relentless work on us.
It’s Holy Week, which means these will be the most important reflections of the year, and it’s not too late to join.
I hope you’ll walk with us as we journey to the redemption of the cross.
“Six days before Passover, Jesus came to Bethany, where Lazarus was, whom Jesus had raised from the dead. They gave a dinner for him there, and Martha served, while Lazarus was one of those reclining at table with him.
“Mary took a liter of costly perfumed oil made from genuine aromatic nard and anointed the feet of Jesus and dried them with her hair; the house was filled with the fragrance of the oil.
“Then Judas the Iscariot, one of his disciples, and the one who would betray him, said, “Why was this oil not sold for three hundred days’ wages and given to the poor?”
“He said this not because he cared about the poor but because he was a thief and held the money bag and used to steal the contributions.
“So Jesus said, “Leave her alone. Let her keep this for the day of my burial. You always have the poor with you, but you do not always have me.”
— John 12:1–8
The perfume cost a year’s wages. Mary of Bethany broke it open anyway.
This is Monday of Holy Week, and the Gospel places us at a dinner table in Bethany six days before Jesus dies. Lazarus is there — the man Jesus raised from the dead, alive and eating, proof that the power at this table is real. Martha is serving. And Mary kneels at Jesus’s feet with a jar of pure nard, pours it over his feet, and wipes them with her hair.
The house fills with the fragrance. The whole house.
Judas speaks up immediately. Why this waste? The perfume could have been sold. The money could have gone to the poor.
John’s Gospel tells us Judas said this not because he cared about the poor but because he was a thief who helped himself from the common purse. But set that aside for a moment. Even if his motives had been pure, the objection would have missed the point entirely.
Mary understood something the apostles did not.
