should only be men. >> over time what we see is women being pushed from a very central role in church organization and leadership to sort of marginal figures on the sidelines. >> if the gospel of mary is not a reliable account of her life, could there be another explanation for mary magdalene's disappearance from the story of the early church? >> when people think of mary magdalene, they often imagine an attractive woman with flowing hair sort of the same age as jesus and undeniably good looking. but she might not have been any of those things. >> could it be that she was, in fact, far older and that the way we have imagined mary magdalene for more than 1500 years has been wrong all along? >> she might have been a very successful, independent