For the Medieval and Reformation class, I chose to read Showings, or Revelations of Divine Love, by Julian of Norwich. I learned that Julian had been an anchoress, living enclosed within the walls of St. Julian’s in the English seaport of Norwich. (This was not abnormal for the fourteenth century; men who took the same vows were called anchorites. They even had a rule, a way of life.)
Julian had two windows from the rooms that were added on to the church for her. One window faced into the church, so that she could participate in the Eucharist. The other window faced the road, so that she could offer counsel and encouragement to those who came seeking either. By tradition, she had a cat. We know from bequests wills of the era that she had women servants; many believe, given her theology and writing style, that she had access to manuscripts from as far away as France. Julian—and we don’t even know her name or much about her life outside her anchorage—was right in keeping with the sensibilities of her time, though her ideas may seem odd to us. She prayed for three gifts, or graces: a recollection of the Passion of Christ; an illness so severe that she expected to die; and the three wounds--true contrition, loving compassion, and longing with my will for God. Julian explains that these gifts were granted on May 13, 1373, when she was thirty. I loved the specificity of that, something I could grasp more easily than the idea of a virgin birth. She received sixteen “showings” or visions during her illness, which she recorded when she recovered her health. She thought about these visions and their meaning for twenty years, and wrote them again, giving us what is known as the Short Text and the Long Text. Julian had a penchant for threes. To give one example: she has a vision of something small, the size of a hazelnut. God explains that this small round thing is everything that exists. In this little thing I saw three properties. The first is that God made it, the second is that God loves it, the third is that God preserves it. My friend Linda brought hazelnuts to class for us; I was one of those who then kept a hazelnut in my pocket for luck during presentations or exams. Julian saved my faith, I tell people (because the first trimester of seminary nearly killed it). I clung to her faith. Julian believed it all, I told myself, despite living through three waves of Black Plague, despite living just down the road from a place where heretics were burned at the stake. Julian had a vision of God as not only Father but also Mother. (Nor was she alone in her own time in believing this; modern feminism isn’t new.) She believed love, not anger, was what motivated God. God is that goodness which cannot be angry, for God is nothing but goodness. Twentieth century poet T. S. Eliot used lines from Julian in Four Quartets: I may make all things well, and I can make all things well, and I shall make all things well, and I will make all things well: and you will see yourself that every kind of thing will be well.
0 Comments
Your comment will be posted after it is approved.
Leave a Reply. |
Saints Alive!
I have been privileged to offer Noonday Prayer at my church, usually on Thursdays, which doesn’t matter because it’s on Youtube forever. [It’s amazing what can be done with a smartphone and a smart, helpful parish administrator!] The service is brief, with a place for a meditation. We usually look at the Episcopal calendar of saints, who are nearly always honored on their death dates, not their birth dates. Here is a hymn by medieval saint Hildegard of Bingen to set the mood.
Archives
April 2024
Categories |