U.S. Catholic is published by the Claretians. That images of Mary Magdalene are identifiable from the beginnings of Christian art into the present is a sign of her critical importance in Christianity. In the Middle Ages and Renaissance, depictions of her Last Communion and penance multiplied, and she came to signify the centrality of the sacraments. During the Counter-Reformation, she became the defender of the sacraments of the Roman Catholic tradition. The transformations of her image are important for assessing the interpretations of this particular woman and of women in general in Christianity.
Visual images are evidence of or react to cultural and theological shifts.
Consider the dramatic changes for women when Christianity became the imperial religion in the fourth century and took on all the trappings of the imperial court, including a denigration of the role of women. When 15th-century Flemish painter Rogier van der Weyden depicted Magdalene as a reader, it was an almost impossible situation for a medieval woman. In creating this image, he was likely influenced by the contemporary Christian laywomen's movement of the Beguines who placed great emphasis on literacy as well as by the then-commonly accepted metaphor of reading as a form of contemplation and prayer. Such images offered spiritual solace. Consider Caravaggio's Repentant Magdalene and Titian's Repentant Magdalene.