An Introduction

On a cold winter night in Zurich, Switzerland in 2000AD Judi Sion asked me if I might contact Mary Magdalene, a figure she (Judi) had been passionately interested in for many years.

This intense interest was no idle curiosity on Judi’s part, but an engrossing journey of her heart and mind that had taken her into the central mystery of the Black Madonna, and her (Judi’s) fervent belief that the displacement of the feminine from her rightful place in the mythic pantheon of “God” had resulted in incalculable damage to women, to their offspring (both male and female), and thus to the world.

Several years previous to that night in Zurich, Judi had undertaken a personal pilgrimage of sorts to Europe with her two daughters to seek out the mystery of the Black Madonna in the land that had given it birth. They visited the sacred sites of ancient goddesses in a swath from northern Europe into Greece and finally into southern France—into a land where both legend and the people still hold as truth that Mary Magdalene lived, taught and healed throughout much of the region.

Many years after Judi’s pilgrimage to “the Land of The Magdalene” in southern France, we were preparing to visit the region together after I finished teaching a workshop in Zurich.

The moment had come. I had finished the workshop and before going to bed, Judi made her request.

Upon settling into the receptive mental state of a light trance, I was floored by an extraordinary feminine intelligence possessing an elegant power I had never, ever experienced before. Her words were mentally and emotionally riveting, and the air seemed to vibrate from the sheer potency of her presence.

The Magdalen Manuscript (ORB) was the result of our encounter with this magnificent being, who insisted that her name be spelled without the e at the end to distinguish her from the maligned and misrepresented being that has been handed down to us by the Church. This being, Mary Magdalen, calmly announced that she was both the wife and the tantric consort to Jeshua Ben Joseph, commonly known as Jesus.

For many reasons, the Manuscript was a turning point for me. Part of this had to do with how it shifted my views on spiritual alchemy as well as sexual tantra. But the Manuscript was also a watershed in regard to my understanding about relationships—specifically the potential for spiritual transformation that lay within Sacred Relationship.

Neither the book, nor my understanding about the place of Sacred Relationship as a spiritual practice, would have happened without Judi. She has been both an impeccable midwife to the Manuscript and a co-pilgrim on this odyssey that we now find ourselves in.

Our intent in creating this Magdalen section of the website is to provide a rich and engaging body of information, over the course of time, for those desiring  the process of Sacred Relationship itself.

I often joke that the path of Sacred Relationship (or Alchemical Relationship, as I prefer to call it) should have a warning sign at the beginning… something akin to:

Be wary all who enter.
This path is not for the faint of heart.
Keep your wits about you and your sense of humor close at hand.

Having said that, I welcome you to the shimmering presence that is Mary Magdalen and this estuary of the feminine mystery.

Tom Kenyon