Women’s Voices II: Julian of Norwich

Julian was a 14th Century, English mystic with an uncompromisingly universalist vision. Hers was a joyful, compassionate God of infinite, mothering love - in direct opposition to the prevailing Catholic doctrine that plagues, wars and other suffering were an angry God's punishment for sin.


Julian saw that we cause our own suffering out of ignorance, sin has no ultimate reality, and there is no blame in God. Confused by the discrepancy between this and Church doctrine, she asked for help. Jesus replied with her most famous quote, “It is behoovely that there shall be sin, but all shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner [of] thing shall be well.”

Icon by Robert Lentz

Julian lived from 1342 to 1416. Her early life is unknown - her name may come from St. Julian’s, the church in Norwich, England where she was an anchoress. At 30, she became deathly ill and had a number of visions. She recovered and wrote a book about it: Revelations of Divine Love. Julian reflected on her visions throughout her life, extensively rewriting her text. She was the first woman known to have written a book in English.

An anchoress lived her entire life in a cell attached to a church. It was a simple life, but fairly comfortable - with servants and a garden - and not at all isolated. Julian must have had access to a good library. She gave spiritual advice from a window opening near a major street - from which she could also hear any news.

Julian lived in the midst of plagues, wars, famines and religious persecution. Witches were burnt at the stake. Peasants rioted over unfair labor and tax laws. The Catholic Church was split among warring popes - the most powerful was in France, with whom England was at war. Just around the corner from her anchorhold, followers of John Wycliff (who translated the Bible into English) were burnt. Julian must have heard the crowds and smelled the charring flesh.

Julian risked being accused of heresy, herself. She seemed aware of this danger as she opens her book by insisting that she is an unlettered woman, just writing what she saw, and that the mistakes of an ignorant woman be forgiven. It must have worked. Despite the radical universalism of her visions, she escaped persecution.

Some quotes from the Revelation of Divine Love:

"Our Soul is made to be God's dwelling place, and the dwelling place of our Soul is God… And I saw no difference between God and our Substance: but as is all God."

"God is… the Ground in whom our Soul stands, and… the means by which our Substance and Sense-nature are kept together... For our Soul sits in God in complete rest, and our Soul stands in God in complete strength, and our Soul is kindly rooted in God in endless love."

"Only Pain blames and punishes, our courteous Lord comforts and sorrows."

"I it am. The greatness and goodness of the Father: I it am. The wisdom and kindness of the Mother: I it am. I am that which is highest. I am that which is lowest. I am that which is All."

"Before God made us, he loved us, which love was never slaked nor ever shall be. And in this love he has done all his work, and in this love he has made all things profitable to us. And in this love our life is everlasting. In our creation we had a beginning. But the love wherein he made us was in him with no beginning. And all this shall be seen in God without end."

Links to some of the many web sites on Julian of Norwich.

Introduction to Revelations at the Camelot Project, sponsored by the University of Rochester.
On Julian at The Spiritual Stars of the Golden Age
Julian Norwich at the Anthology of Middle English Literature
The God's Friends Website: Julian of Norwich, the Showing of Love (translations by Julia Bolton Holloway) and its contexts
The Christian Classics Ethereal Library, Revelations text online