Myself and Mary WC are responsible for contemporary worship at Trinity on May 15th. Our theme is Julian of Norwich. Now, I was somewhat familiar with Julian from previous English lit classes, but those books are left to be dusted off somewhere. Anyway, Mary and I were working previously on It's A Wonderful Church, and the Julian idea came up as something we would like to dig deeper into following Easter. So we are. And it is good. Gwen loaned me a book by Ralph Milton, which is a fictional account of Julian's life, and I am almost finished reading that. I also had the Library find me another book by Milton called The Essence of Julian.
If you have the time, and quiet in your life, you might want to check out Julian. She was the first woman to write a book in English! Pretty amazing. She was born in 1342 in Norwich, England. A lot of her writings are tough, but amazingly enough, relateable today. Although she's writing out of her mid-evil world, I am still finding a lot of ideas that strike a chord with me. When she was 30, she had a very serious illness (of course the plague was wiping out communities all around her) during which she experienced a series of visions. She wrote both short and long versions of these visions from God and at some point she became an anchorite at the Church in Norwich. It's all very interesting. If I ever get to England again, I will visit that Church.
Julian's life was committed to prayer and counsel to those who came to her window to seek her wisdom. On May 15th, we are going to try and share some of her messages, in both word and song. One piece of special music will be Linnea Good's Bells of Norwich, which I find hauntingly beautiful. I will do my best at a couple of monologues. Charlotte is helping with costume and Charleen with set. And of course, Mary will be sharing her knowledge on Julian which is much more than mine, as well as personal reflections on this First Woman of Letters.
"For God is all that is good, and God made all that is made, and God loves every part of it. If you love all people because of God's love, then you love each created thing, because you love the creator. For God is in every person, and every person is in God. If you love in this way, you love all."
Peace today. What's that in the sky? Is it a bird, a plane? No, it's THE SUN, surrounded by the most beautiful blue. The earth will sprout today!
Emma Lee
Makes me wish I was still close enough to attend Trinity...
ReplyDeleteTake care...sun is now shining brightly here...I was worried...heard it was in other places, but finally it is out here!
Have a great day!