Julian's Ladders of Perfection Among contemporary lovers of Julian of Norwich there are many who have never read her entire book. There are many reasons for this. Chief among them is that she is not always easy to read. Even rendered in modern English, her fourteenth century prose can be daunting. Then, too, her style is more like the spoken, rather than written word. While this provides a refreshing familiarity for the reader (compared with the medieval Scholastic theologians who were among her contemporaries, ) we often must follow her through dependent clauses, subtexts, flashbacks, and...

Living in Norwich, England in the 14th and early 15th century, Dame Julian of Norwich spent much of her life as an anchorite, that is, as a vowed religious living by herself in a small room attached to a parish church. Beyond this, little is actually known about Dame Julian, as she was called. What is known about her, and what makes her an inspiration for so many "ordinary Christians" today is her remarkable book, Revelations of Divine Love, or, as she called them, Showings. The Revelations are a description of a series of visions which opened Julian to the depths of God's unconditioned love...