Monika Siara’s drama Women, the Great Sinners was inspired by our participation in the “New Epiphanies” Lab. Going back to the story of the Angel Makers, we noticed that social norms and economic conditions often forced women to commit crimes. In this context, the question arises: why is it always only women who are guilty and why do women bear all the blame? A similar mechanism works nowadays, for example in some countries where religion plays a leading role: abortion is banned and at the same time women do not get support for raising children. Such situations lead to tragedy, and society always blames women. In the meantime, there is usually a man behind a woman’s decision: the partner, the father, the lawmaker, or a priest. In the drama, in addition to the Angel Maker and her Client, there appears Mary Magdalene, who has figurative meaning for us. In tradition Mary Magdalene is a symbol of sin, but if we delve carefully into the sources it turns out that she was an ambiguous figure and that her story was complicated. That is why, for us, Mary Magdalene has become the patron saint of those who have been superficially judged or unjustly punished. She offers empathy and gives a helping hand to women who suffer and are stigmatized for sins that did not result from bad intentions but from necessity caused by external factors. Reading evoked very lively, mostly negative, reactions from the audience, especially from women. There seems to be plenty of work to be done for people’s mentality to change significantly.
