Mary Magdalene is, aside from the Virgin Mary, perhaps the most prominent woman in the Christian tradition. To this day, she remains one of the most popular saints, the subject of innumerable exalted tributes. Churches have been named in her honor; poems have been written about her relationship to Christ; and films, TV shows, and even a Broadway musical have taken her as their central subject. She has also been the focus of extensive Biblical scholarship and a focal point of scriptural conspiracy theories. And yet she is mentioned only a total of fourteen times in the New Testament. Her outsize influence in the story of Christ—and the story of Easter—is attributed to one event, noted in all four Gospels: she receives news that Jesus is Resurrected, and spreads word of his return to his disciples.

Over time, as Christianity and cultural attitudes shifted, preachers, scholars, and different sects of the faith have retooled Magdalene’s story. She suddenly became a sinner, an emotional woman and a prostitute who eventually reforms her ways through Christ’s teachings and equanimity. Preachers have held her up as a warning about the temptations of lust and of the sins of wayward youth, and as a symbol of Christ’s humility.

In a fascinating piece from 2006, Joan Acocella explores how Mary Magdalene’s story has been stretched, contested, and outright romanticized over the course of two thousand years. Along the way, Magdalene has become a symbol for outcasts, one of the “shaping forces of Christianity,” and a captivating figure in secular culture. (The word “maudlin,” it turns out, is a derivative of Magdalene.) Acocella’s reporting is also an incisive look into how Christianity, in the name of promoting virtues of chastity and purity, has treated women throughout its history, and how religion and faith evolves.