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Across six centuries, the voice of Julian of Norwich speaks to us about love. She communicates personally, as if she were very much with us here and now. Even more than theological explanations, we all hunger for love. Our hearts yearn for someone we can trust absolutely—divine love that can never fail. Julian reveals this love because, like Mary Magdalene, she experienced it firsthand. Julian tells us about her mystical visions of Christ’s love on the cross and how that love totally transformed her life. Unlike other medieval mystics (who may appear sometimes too extreme, too ascetic, or too intellectual for our postmodern taste), Julian comes across as a flesh and blood woman, thoroughly sympathetic to our human condition. And in heartfelt terms she expresses her profound awareness of God who became human like us, suffered, died, and was transformed into glory.
Why is Julian so appealing today? I think because she is totally vulnerable and transparently honest, without any guile. She is “homely”; in medieval terms, that means down-to-earth, familiar, and easily accessible. She is keenly aware of her spiritual brokenness and longs to be healed. So do we. She experiences great suffering of body, mind, and soul. So do we. She has moments of doubt. So do we. She seeks answers to age-old questions. So do we. Then, at a critical turning point in her revelations, she is overwhelmed by joy and “gramercy” (great thanks) for the graces she is receiving. We, too, are suddenly granted graces and filled to overflowing with gratitude. Sometimes, we even experience our own divine revelations. Again and again, Julian reassures each one of us that we are loved by God, unconditionally. In her writings, we hear Christ telling us, just as he told Julian: “I love you and you love me, and our love shall never be separated in two” (58:13-14.307). Indeed, Julian’s teachings have greatly endeared her to Christians and non-Christians alike. Everyone can relate to her as a spiritual mentor because we sense that, even though she lived and wrote six hundred years ago, Julian the mystic, the seeker, and the theologian is very much “a woman for all seasons.” Julian’s voice of prophetic hope, speaking to us from the fourteenth century, is one that we in the twenty-first century desperately need to hear. As we approach St. Valentine's Day and hear a wide range of talk about human love, let us turn to Julian's Revelations to learn about unconditional divine love. Then we may begin to fathom what real love is all about. PLEASE NOTE: The excerpt above is from "An Explorer’s Guide to Julian of Norwich" (InterVarsity Academic Press, 2018). Copyright © 2018 by Veronica Mary Rolf. All rights reserved.
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Some of you may wonder about the connection between my two books on Julian of Norwich and my newest book, Suddenly There is God: the Story of Our Lives in Sacred Scripture" (Cascade Books, 2019). I offer an excerpt from Julian's own teachings as a partial explanation of the intimate relationship I see between Julian's Revelations, sacred Scripture, and beholding God's appearances -- both in contemplative prayer and in life -- Suddenly!
In her Second Revelation, Julian of Norwich teaches us that God wants to be seen in every circumstance. The more difficult the circumstance, the more crucial it becomes that we seek his presence within it. God wants to be sought so that our hearts remain open and receptive to divine help. God wants to be waited for in patience and in hope. Most of all, God wants to be trusted. Julian understands that the continual seeking of the soul is very pleasing to God, and the “finding of God” fills the soul with incomparable joy. For [the soul] may do no more than seek, suffer, and trust. . . . The seeking with faith, hope and charity pleases our lord, and the finding pleases the soul, and fulfills it with joy. Where is God in Suffering? However, you may object: It is one thing to “seek” God in every love, happiness, creative work, achievement, and birth. But how are we supposed to “seek” God in every disappointment, betrayal, illness, tragedy, or death? At such times, the soul feels completely alone and abandoned. Our faith becomes sorely tested. Where is God in suffering? Yet Julian is insistent that we must continue to seek God and walk by faith through the longest days and darkest nights. She assures us that even though we may think our faith is “but little” and fragile, nevertheless through the daily practice of believing in God’s abiding presence, we will gain great grace to endure the tough times. Julian considers this blind “seeking” of God every bit as necessary as enlightened “seeing.” She is certain that, eventually, God will reveal himself and teach the soul how to experience the deep comfort of divine presence in contemplation. This “beholding” is the highest honor and reverence human beings can give to God, and is extremely profitable to all souls, producing the greatest humility and virtue, “with the grace and leading of the holy ghost.” For a soul that fastens itself only onto God with great trust, either in seeking or in beholding, it is the most worship that that soul may do, as to my sight. Julian understands two kinds of divine werking from this revelation: seeking and beholding. Both are gifts of God. Seeking is what is given to all of us to do, through the teachings of holy church. Beholding (or mystical contemplation), on the other hand, is given more rarely, directly by God. Julian further defines three ways of seeking. First, we must seek willfully and faithfully, without growing lazy in our efforts. We must seek “gladly and merrily, without unskillful heaviness and vain sorrow,” because these are self-indulgent moods that can undermine the spiritual life. Here Julian gives us a subtle indication of her own personal struggles against spiritual lethargy and depression. Second, the true seeker abides in God steadfastly, without "grumbling and striving against him." This is a wonderfully apt description of the complaints and disobedience that obstruct the flow of grace. The third way of seeking is that “we trust in [God] mightily, with full, seker faith.” Julian is certain that these three ways of seeking will bear abundant fruit in beholding. Then God will suddenly reveal his presence when the soul is least expecting it. For it is his will that we know that he shall appear suddenly and blissfully to all his lovers. For his werking is private, and he wants to be perceived, and his appearing shall be very sudden. And he wants to be believed, for he is very pleasant, homely, and courteous. Blessed may he be! What Would It Mean? What difference would it make in our lives if we really sought Jesus within all our experiences? Not just the joyous ones, but the suffering ones, too. Even if people reject us and hurt us, even if events in our lives are painful—what if we chose to trust that the Divine Master is working from deep within the suffering in order to transform it? What if we dared to believe, like Julian, that our fastening onto God with seker trust, “whether in seeking or in beholding,” gives God the greatest possible worship? Would it not make all the difference in how we deal with our problems? Would it not give meaning to our suffering? And might it not change our mental attitude from that of “victim” to a “loving companion” of Christ on the cross? PLEASE NOTE: The excerpts above are from An Explorer’s Guide to Julian of Norwich (InterVarsity Academic Press, 2018). Copyright © 2018 by Veronica Mary Rolf. All rights reserved. This article may not be copied or reprinted without the express permission of the author. Suddenly There is God": The Story of Our Lives in Sacred Scripture (Cascade Books Imprint, 2019) is available from the publisher, Wipf and Stock: https://wipfandstock.com/suddenly-there-is-god.html Also at Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/153267449X?pf_rd_p=ab873d20-a0ca-439b-ac45-cd78f07a84d8&pf_rd_r=T0ASTV6SSNT5Z40YE98T In the First Revelation, as Julian of Norwich beheld Christ on the cross, she also longed to see Mary, his mother. But by her own accounting, she did not Mary “in the flesh” as she saw Christ, but rather “ghostly, in bodily likeness.” This implies that Julian saw Mary appear suddenly and distinctly in her imagination, without any effort on Julian’s part to conjure her. Julian was granted a glimpse into the beauty of Mary’s soul and the holy awe in which she contemplated God:
God showed me in part the wisdom and truth of her soul, wherein I understood the reverent beholding in which she beheld her God, that is, her maker, marveling with great reverence that he would be born of her who was a simple creature of his making. For this was her marveling: that he who was her maker would be born of her who was made. And this wisdom and truth, knowing the greatness of her maker and the littleness of herself that is made, made her say so meekly to Gabriel: “Lo me here, God’s handmaiden.” In this meditation, Julian is keenly aware that Mary was, like herself, “a simple creature,” uneducated, and without any earthly nobility. Yet Julian understood truly that Mary was more worthy than all other creatures God had ever made, because she was conceived without sin. All other creatures are therefore below her. And above her is “nothing that is made but the blessed manhood of Christ, as to my sight.” This Christmas season, let us take time away from the hustle and bustle to enter into the stable – the silent stability of daily meditation – to join with Mary and Joseph, in “reverent beholding” of God in the flesh of a newborn baby. May we be graced to see that Christ is breaking through the darkness to reveal Divine Reality that is always and everywhere at work – even and perhaps especially when we cannot see or feel it. Christ is our Light who transforms the meaning of everything from sadness to serenity, from fear to courage, from helplessness to hope. Let us open wide the manger of our hearts to receive this newborn God-Child, knowing the greatness of our maker and the littleness of ourselves. May we also “marvel with great reverence” that the little Lord Jesus is being born anew "of us" this very day through our own love and compassion, mercy and kindness, laughter and friendship. And may this be our marveling: that he who is our Maker is born of we who are made! And in this "wisdom and truth" may we always be ready to say: “Lo, me here, God’s servant” in whatever life situation we find ourselves. Then our Christmas will itself become a light to help dispel the despair of our discordant world. PLEASE NOTE: Excerpts above are from Julian's Gospel: Illuminating the Life & Revelations of Julian of Norwich (Orbis Books), Copyright © 2013 by Veronica Mary Rolf. All rights reserved. This article may not be copied or reprinted without the express permission of the author. I Am the Ground
In the Fourteenth Revelation, Julian tells us what the Lord told her about prayer: “I am the ground of thy beseeching. First it is my will that thou have it, and next I make thee to will it, and next I make thee to beseech it—and thou beseechest it! How should it then be that thou shouldst not have thy beseeching?” In an astounding moment, the Lord completely inverts the idea that prayer is initiated in any way by Julian (or us!) with the Revelation that it is entirely his own idea. He identifies himself as the instigator and basis of all prayer. First, in his great goodness, Christ wills to give her some grace, then he makes her conscious of the desire for it. Next, he inspires her and gives her the desire to enter into prayer in order to beseech it. And then, she actually does beseech it in her prayer. Finally, Christ asks Julian the all important rhetorical question: “How could it then be that you would not receive what you were beseeching me for?” (since it was Christ himself who conceived the grace he wanted to give Julian in the first place!). Of course, this Revelation assumes that what Julian will be led to pray for will be to her most immediate benefit, as well as her eternal salvation, and will bring the greatest blessings upon those for whom she prays. Julian became convinced that when we pray it is in response to God’s desire to grant what we most urgently need. Our prayers of beseeching do not cause graces and gifts to come to us from God. It is God’s own goodness, the ground of all that is, that initiates every good thing he ever chooses to give us. He is ready to give before we even ask. Prayer of Thanksgiving In addition to petitionary prayer, Julian stresses the prayer of thanksgiving. This is “a true, inward knowing,” whereby we dedicate all our energies to the good work that the Lord directs us to do, “rejoicing and thanking inwardly.” Julian reveals that sometimes this prayer of thanksgiving is so overwhelming that it breaks out in full voice saying: “Good lord, grant mercy, blessed may thou be!” And at other times, when the heart feels dry and empty, or else is undergoing temptations, then prayer “is driven by reason and by grace to cry aloud to our Lord, remembering his blessed passion and his great goodness.” Either way, the strength of the Lord’s own word will enter into the soul, enliven the heart, begin a new spiritual work by means of grace, and enable the soul to pray more blissfully and to rejoice in him. “This is a very lovely thanking in his sight.” Three Aspects of Prayer Julian summarizes three aspects that should determine our understanding of prayer. The first, as already mentioned, is to know from whom and how our prayer originates. Christ made clear that he is the instigator of prayer when he said, “I am the ground.” And he revealed how prayer develops because of his goodness when he said, “First, it is my will that thou have it.” The second aspect concerns the manner in which we say our prayers. Our will should always be turned entirely toward the will of the Lord, not in fear but in great enjoyment. Christ clarified this for Julian when he said: “I make thee to will it.” And the third aspect focuses on the fruit and goal of our prayer, which is “to be oned with and like our lord in everything.” “And to this meaning and for this end was all this lovely lesson shown. And he will help us, and he shall make it so, as he says himself. Blessed might he be!” Additionally, Julian suggests that both our prayer and our trust should be equally “large,” which in Middle English implies generous and ample, even ambitious. “For if we do not trust as much as we pray, we do not give the fullest worship to our lord in our prayer, and also we hinder and trouble ourselves.” Julian considers that the reason we become hesitant and lacking in trust is that we think the impetus to pray is coming from ourselves instead of from Christ. If we were absolutely certain that Christ is the “ground in whom our prayer springs” and that prayer is itself “given to us by grace of his love,” then we would naturally trust that we would have “all that we desire.” This Thanksgiving Day (and every day) let us have confidence that the deepest desires of our heart really do arise from “the ground” of our being. And that it is Christ himself prompting us to pray for them, preparing us to receive them, and encouraging us to trust “mightily” that he desires to fill our hearts to overflowing. And let us “give thanks-in-advance” for all that the Lord is accomplishing in and through us, though we know not how. Happy Thanksgiving to all! PLEASE NOTE: Excerpts above are from Julian's Gospel: Illuminating the Life & Revelations of Julian of Norwich (Orbis Books), Copyright © 2013 by Veronica Mary Rolf. All rights reserved. This article may not be copied or reprinted without the express permission of the author. In a world of discord, violence, and strife, amidst crises in our families and in our personal lives, we yearn for God to “speak” to us – to bring justice and mercy, to heal and forgive. Julian of Norwich felt the same way. She longed for meaning to the suffering and persecution in her own world. She ached for clarity in a sea of doubt and questions. That is why her Revelations of Divine Love “speak” to us at such a profound and reassuring level. Julian sought “sekernesse” – security, safety, certainty. So do we. She longed for a love that would never fail. So do we. She learned to trust the Christ who told her “alle shalle be wele”—in spite of how bad things looked all around her. So must we.
What gave Julian the foundation of her faith and hope and love? She was steeped in sacred Scripture. She did not own a Bible; only a few wealthy aristocrats did in her time. And anyway, the Bible was in Latin which, by her own account, she could not read. The Lollard Bible translations into English were considered heretical in her lifetime and forbidden by the church. Anyone who read or discussed them was subject to trial and severe punishment. Then how did Julian imbibe the Scriptures? By hearing. By listening to sermons, by being drawn in to the Corpus Christi mystery and passion plays of her time, and by praying the psalms (there was a Lay Folk’s prayer book that included translations of the psalms for daily practice). Throughout her sixteen Revelations, Julian makes numerous references to sacred Scripture. She may misquote the exact texts, but she knows the true meaning “by heart.” She also references St. Paul in many of her teachings. And in writing of God as our life, love, and life, she echoes John the evangelist. The Great Deed Precisely because she was steeped in stories of the Old and New Testament, especially the Gospels, she trusted that God had a plan of salvation and vindication that would be fulfilled—no matter how many evil deeds seemed to thwart it. She was given a revelation about a “Great Deed” that gave her immense comfort: For this is the great deed that our lord God shall do, in which deed he shall save his word in alle thing and he shall make wele all that is not wele. But what the deed shall be, and how it shall be done, there is no creature beneath Christ who knows it, nor shall know it, till it is done, according to the understanding that I took of our lord’s meaning at this time. Julian also took comfort in remembering all the great deeds that Christ has done in the past. She believed it is God’s will “that we have great regard for all the deeds that he [Christ] has done” already and in such profusion, because then we will more readily “know, trust, and believe all that he shall do.” Yet she warned that we must not try to conjure up what the Great Deed will be. Instead, we must become more like the saints in heaven who want nothing but what God wills. Then shall we only rejoice in God and be well apaid [satisfied] both with hiding and showing. For I saw truly in our lord’s meaning, the more we busy ourselves to know his privities in that or in any other thing, the further shall we be from the knowing. A Second Deed Julian also understood that there will be a “second deed’ that will be known sooner (that is, when we die and enter heaven), while the Great Deed will not be revealed to anyone in heaven or on earth until it is accomplished at the end of the world. Let us also steep ourselves in the vibrant revelations of sacred Scripture, since we are blessed with the ability to read and meditate on it in our own language. Let us draw strength from the promises made to Abraham and Moses, to Mary and Joseph, and to countless other characters in the divine-human drama of sacred Scripture. Let us see in the stories of Scripture parallels to the story of our own lives. Then, like Julian, we will be fortified in hope and in secure trust that God’s will cannot and will not fail. PLEASE NOTE: Excerpts above are from Julian's Gospel: Illuminating the Life & Revelations of Julian of Norwich (Orbis Books), Copyright © 2013 by Veronica Mary Rolf. All rights reserved. This article may not be copied or reprinted without the express permission of the author. In the Thirteenth Revelation, Julian contemplated not only how “alle shalle be wele” but also, why there is so much evil in the world. She wrote:
There are many evil deeds done in our sight and such great harms suffered that it seems to us that it were unpossible [impossible] that ever it should come to a good end. Julian simply could not see how the problem of evil could be “made wele”: And upon this [evil] we look, sorrowing and mourning therefore, so that we can not rest ourselves in the blissful beholding of God as we should do. And the cause is this: that the use of our reason is now so blind, so low, and so simple, that we can not know the high, the marvelous wisdom, the might, and the goodness of the blissful trinity. The Effects of Evil Deeds Julian could not forget the brutalities that had torn apart the very fabric of her life. She had not been a cloistered nun or a distant observer of the sufferings of her age. She had seen peasants bound by ropes and dragged through the streets, hanging from the back of horse-drawn carts. She had watched severed heads be raised atop pikes on the walls of Norwich. She had witnessed the hands of thieves cut off as punishment. She knew about the evils perpetrated by immoral clergy and nobility alike. She had heard the stories of rape, murder, and pillage from the war. She had held her disconsolate evencristens, crying aloud in her arms. She had spent years “sorrowing and mourning” and been unable to rest “in the blissful beholding of God.” More than once, she must have asked the question that has no human answer: how could such evil deeds ever come to a good end? Julian was painfully aware that the presence of evil impacts all who look on it, listen to it, smell it, touch it. The effects of evil deeds wreak havoc in our emotional lives and test our faith in the goodness of God. The seeming triumph of evil that, for a time at least, goes unpunished, raises severe questions about God’s lack of intervention. The terrible sufferings produced by evil wear down our hope in ever being set free from its clutches. Evil disillusions and embitters our hearts, making us unable to love or trust God as we should. Evil arouses annoyance, fuels anger, feeds the desire for revenge. And in all this, we become unable to pray, to praise, and to give glory to God as we ought to do. We cannot rest in contemplating the pure goodness of God. We are worn out with weeping. Don't Despair Julian is admitting here that she knows this debilitating process only too well. She has looked on evil and been shaken to the core by her contact with it. Yet she refuses to blame God for evil. She insists that the cause of our despair over the all-pervasiveness of evil is that our reasoning minds are “so blind, so low, and so simple.” What she means is that we simply cannot comprehend the transcendence of the Trinity in its glorious wisdom, might, and goodness. We may find it easier to believe that God may not, can not, will not, and shall not save all humankind, and that we shall never see him make “alle manner of thing wele.” This is due to our inability to comprehend who God is and what God is capable of accomplishing. It is also symptomatic of our lack of faith. It takes a long time for us to allow God’s promise to filter through our fears and find a home deep in our injured psyches. And thus, this is what he means where he says: “Thou shalt see thyself that alle manner of thing shalle be wele,” as if he had said: “Take heed now, faithfully and trustingly, and at the last end thou shalt see truly in fullness of joy.” Take Heed! Julian insists we must take sharp notice of what Christ is saying. We must have faith and trust in his promises, most especially because we cannot see how this or that particular evil could ever “come to a good end.” We must hang on Christ’s words, counting on him to make all things well at the end of time, even though we have no idea how he will ever do it. We must believe that he can and wants to do it. Such belief does not arise easily. It is an acquired habit. It takes continual and determined practice. But if we do practice such belief, then “at the last end,” we will be able to “see truly in the fullness of joy” how Christ has done it. In these cruel times of persecution for so many millions of God’s beloved children, let us encourage one another to hang onto hope that Christ IS at work, caring and comforting, healing and reassuring, even though we know not how. Eventually, Justice will be done. Mercy will abound. As Mary sang in her Magnfcat: God will "bring down rulers from their thrones and lift up the humble." God "will fill the hungry with good things and send the rich away empty." And in our own times of trial, let us trust "mightily" that, as Julian understood, “Thou shalt see thyself that alle manner of thing shalle be wele.” PLEASE NOTE: Excerpts above are from Julian's Gospel: Illuminating the Life & Revelations of Julian of Norwich (Orbis Books), Copyright © 2013 by Veronica Mary Rolf. All rights reserved. This article may not be copied or reprinted without the express permission of the author. In her last Revelation, Julian understood that “our soul may never have rest in any thing that is beneath itself.” Furthermore, she realized that when the soul rises above all creatures in a state of contemplative prayer, it cannot even rest in beholding itself. It must set its concentration on the vastness of God’s presence within the soul. “For in man’s soul is God’s true dwelling,” and “the highest light and the brightest shining of the city” within that soul is God’s glorious love.
And what could make the soul happier than to know that God “delights in us, the highest of all his works”? For I saw in the same showing that if the blessed trinity might have made the human soul any better, any fairer, any nobler than it was, God should not have been fully pleased with the making of the soul. But because the trinity made the human soul as beautiful, as good, as precious a creature as it might make it, therefore the blessed trinity is fully pleased without end in the making of our soul. And God wills that our hearts be mightily raised above the deepnesse of the earth and all vain sorrows, and rejoice in him. Beholding Julian takes great comfort in this final Revelation that God dwells in her soul. And she is certain that God wants us all to take the same comfort through the practice of “beholding.” This was a delectable sight and a restful showing that is without end. And the beholding of this while we are here, it is very pleasant to God, and a very great benefit to us. And the soul that thus beholds, makes itself like to him that it is beheld, and oneth it in rest and in peace by his grace. And this was a singular joy and bliss to me that I saw him sit, for the security of sitting showed endless dwelling. This type of contemplative prayer (waiting on God, in stillness, without asking for anything) gives God great pleasure and the soul great profit. Such silent prayer forms the soul into a truer image and likeness of the very One who is being contemplated. Julian is especially delighted that she saw the Lord seated in her soul (rather than standing or moving), because sitting symbolizes the familiar rest one takes at home, in complete contentment, peace, and love. God is not going anywhere. It is we who rush about, too busy with our lives and too distracted by our sufferings to take time to experience his inward presence. He thirsts for us to “Be still, and know that I am God!” (Ps 46:10). And if we come to him with our labors and our heavy burdens, he promises to give us true rest (Mt 11:28). In spite of all the anger, hatred, and violence in the world, we, too, can find rest in contemplating the goodness of God and the salvation of Jesus Christ that is transforming all suffering into eternal honors. Julian’s fourteenth century was also a violent, tumultuous era. Nevertheless, Julian could rejoice on a daily basis that God’s true dwelling is forever in the human soul. As Christ said to his disciples: “the kingdom of God is within you” (Lk 17:21). Let us learn from Julian how to behold that divine reality and unconditional love within our souls. Then we ourselves may become sources of light, healing, and peace for the whole world. PLEASE NOTE: Excerpts above are from Julian's Gospel: Illuminating the Life & Revelations of Julian of Norwich (Orbis Books), Copyright © 2013 by Veronica Mary Rolf. All rights reserved. This article may not be copied or reprinted without the express permission of the author. In the Third Revelation, Julian of Norwich heard an outpouring of words from Christ within her soul: And all this he showed full blissfully, meaning thus: “See, I am God. See, I am in all thing. See, I do all thing. See, I never take my hands from my works, nor never shall without end. See, I lead all things to the end that I ordained it to, from without beginning, by the same might, wisdom, and love with which I made it. How should any thing be amiss?”
In an instant, Julian experiences not only that God IS, but that God is the underlying Reality of all things, whether or not she is able to “see” how this could be so . . . that God does all that is done, but that he “does no evil” . . . that God never removes his “hand” from that which he creates, nor ever has, nor ever shall . . . that God leads every single person and every single thing to the ultimate end for which it was created in the beginning . . . that God does all this with the same trinitarian “might, wisdom and love” with which he creates all that is. And finally, since such God-ness eternally IS, “How should any thing be amiss?” Julian is hearing the Spirit within her mind describe the world as it is forever being created by perfect Wisdom, not as it is falsified and corrupted by the ignorance and sinfulness of humankind. In this ecstatic experience of Divine Reality, everything is immaculate, blissful, perfectly ordered to its appropriate end. All is accomplished through God’s infinite power, wisdom, and love. Every tree is a divine image, every creature reflects its Creator, every human being walks in the garden of God’s love. There is no evil, no sin, no disorder. All is as it was created to be. Such is the kingdom of God. Yet . . . as sublime an insight as this was, Julian admits that her soul was greatly tested by this vision. “Thus mightily, wisely, and lovingly was the soul tested in this vision.” How could she call such a glorious Revelation “a test”? Perhaps because the two world views, one of the heavenly kingdom, and the other of the earthly existence Julian knew only too well, could not be reconciled in her mind. The teaching that all that is done on earth is done by God for the best possible “end” was still incomprehensible to her; it was not her normal way of viewing evil in the world. Given her life experience, she could not readily discount the violence and grave injustices she had seen, the sufferings she had undergone, the terrible toll of the plagues on her family and friends, the maimings and deaths of war, the pains of childbirth, the scandals of the papal schism, the Lollard heresies rampant in the church, the violence of the peasants’ revolt, the adultery, brutality, cheating, lying, and corruption of her evencristens in Norwich; the quarrels and jealousies within her own family; her own deep sense of wretchedness. There seemed to be no end to the many faces of cosmic evil and personal sin. One senses that, in spite of Julian's absolute certitude concerning the truth of this Revelation of “God in all things,” she simply could not fathom how God might be working in and through the evils of sin, suffering, and death to lead all things to a perfect ending, according to his divine purpose. She must have heard the rhetorical question in her mind: “How could any thing be amiss?” with a burst of joy one minute, and, in the next, been hit hard by the realization that obviously so much all around her was sorely amiss. (We may certainly identify with her in our own age of anxiety.) And we must remember that all during this revelation, Julian was still facing Christ on the cross, suffering for the sins of humankind. How could such agony have been part of God’s plan from all eternity? Julian implies here that she felt deeply mired in the human condition while God was showing her a divine dimension, a transcendent perspective beyond anything she could have imagined. And in this blessed moment she felt she was being tested, in the sense of being challenged to break open her mind to an entirely different plane of reality. Throughout her Revelations, Julian’s daring spirit will fly directly into the burning sun of divine revelation, only to fall back to earth like a blinded bird. True illumination never happens without a struggle, an intense contest between two versions of reality, human and divine. Julian’s agon was no different. She could not yet grasp the full implications of what God was revealing about the righteousness of all his works. Even so, Julian knew well that it behooved her to assent to the import of the vision “with great reverence,” whether or not she understood it, because she believed it to be true. “Then I saw truly that it behooved me to assent with great reverence, enjoying God.” The letter to the Hebrews spoke of faith as “the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen” (Heb 11:1, italics added). Julian does not see or comprehend. Thus her faith is being tested. She feels called simply to rest for a while, and enjoy God. “Be still, and know that I am God!” sings the psalmist (Ps 46:10). “See! I am God,” cries the Holy Spirit within Julian. If, in the midst of our own sufferings, doubts, and debilitating fears, we also take time every day to rest a while in childlike trust, letting go and dropping into the arms of our loving Lord, then we, too, could find peace within the divine dimension, “enjoying God.” And then, we, too, might be privileged to experience how (in the divine dimension) everything is already being made well. May Julian be our inspiration to do so! PLEASE NOTE: Excerpts above are from Julian's Gospel: Illuminating the Life & Revelations of Julian of Norwich (Orbis Books), Copyright © 2013 by Veronica Mary Rolf. All rights reserved. This article may not be copied or reprinted without the express permission of the author. In the Tenth Revelation, while Julian of Norwich is immersed in contemplating Christ on the cross, she sees him gaze into the wound on his right side with a joyous expression. Through this shift in the focus of Christ’s eyes, Julian understands that he is inviting her to enter mystically, through the open wound, into the depths of his Sacred Heart. It is such a magnanimous gesture, like the resurrected Christ showing his five wounds to Thomas and inviting him to touch and “do not doubt but believe” (Jn 20:27).
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