Feast Day of Julian of Norwich

Julian is one of my favorites among the saints. The constant thread that runs through all of her writing is the limitless love of God for all his creatures, without exception, without qualification, the love that is given freely and can never be earned.


Very little is known about the person who wrote these meditations and reflections, not even that author's name. According to the opening lines of the manuscripts that are available, she was a woman living in England during the fourteenth century. On May 13, 1373, when she was thirty and a half years old, she reported seeing sixteen showings, or mystical visions. Quite soon after this event the young woman recorded the content of these revelations in a text entitled "The Book Of Showings". Some fifteen to twenty years later, she produced an extended version of the same sixteen revelations. At some point in her life she became an anchoress, and entered a cell attached to the Church of St. Julian at Norwich, in East Anglia. She took the name of the patron saint of her anchorhold according to the custom of the anchorites and and anchoresses. It is not known whether she embraced the anchorite life-style before or after she wrote the later edition of the "Book of Showings", but the civil records of Norwich indicate that the Lady Julian remained in the anchorhold at Norwich until her death sometime between 1416 and 1419 A.D.

From the Foreword by Patricia M. Vinje

....

While we are in possession of over fifty manuscripts of her contemporary, Walter Hilton, we have at the most five for Julian. It would seem that her work was not well circulated in her day or in ours. Why is this? I would venture two guesses: First because she is a woman; and secondly, because she is creation-centered. While Hilton's claim to fame was the tired image of climbing the spiritual ladder, Julian ignores such bouquets to established powers for a way of living that is non-competitive, non-compulsive, that is curved and compassionate to all creatures....

From the Foreword by Matthew Fox


From Julian's "Showings":

God said:

"This I am-
the capability and goodness
of the Fatherhood.
This I am-
the wisdom of the Motherhood.
This I am-
the light and the grace
that is all love.
This I am-
the Trinity.
This I am-
the Unity.
I am the sovereign goodness
of all things.
I am what makes you love.
I am what makes you long and desire.
This I am-
the endless fulfilling of all desires."


The quotes above and the version of Julian's words have all been taken from Brenden Doyle's Meditations with Julian of Norwich.

PRAYER
Lord God, who in your compassion granted to the Lady Julian many revelations of your nurturing and sustaining love: Move our hearts, like hers, to seek you above all things, for in giving us yourself you give us all; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

As usual, Saint Pat, at No Claim To Sainthood, was ahead of me with lovely post of her own in honor of Julian.