Revelations of Divine Love (1393), Julian of Norwich; “Little Gidding” (1942), T. S. Eliot

1. “All shall be well and all shall be well and all manner of thing shall be well.” Julian of Norwich (b. 1343) penned these words when, by her own account, she lay dying and had a mystical experience. What she saw led her to choose the life of an anchoress (one who chooses to live in religious seclusion). In fact, she became one of the most celebrated anchoresses of the medieval period. What experiences have marked major spiritual turning points for you?
2. Anchoresses led lives of austerity, walled into enclosed cells in urban settings. In the case of Julian, she attached herself to St. Julian’s church, hence the name by which she came to be called. For twenty years, living in the walled city of Norwich, Julian recorded long and short versions of her showings. She remained in relative obscurity until the poet T. S. Eliot discovered her work and quoted her:

And all shall be well and
All manner of thing shall be well

When the tongues of flame are in-folded
Into the crowned knot of fire
And the fire and the rose are one.

Thus ends “Little Gidding,” the final poem in what is arguably the greatest literary achievement (“The Four Quartets”) of the most influential poet of the twentieth century. In the last two sections of “Little Gidding,” he quoted Julian’s phrase three times. Do you live in relative obscurity? Are you content with your degree of visibility? Why or why not?   

3.  C. S. Lewis discussed “the problem of pain,” but Julian pondered it centuries earlier, asking the age-old question: If God is all-wise and all-powerful, why would sin be allowed to ruin the creation? What circumstances make you ponder the problem of pain? What circumstances are hoping for God to redeem?
4. In Julian’s thirteenth “shewing,” recorded in chapter twenty-seven of her Revelations, she answers the “Why” of sin from the point of view of Christ: “it ‘behoved’ that there should be sin, but all shall be well and all shall be well and all manner of thing shall be well.” Sin had to be. Of course, Julian wasn’t the first or the only one to say so. Some of Paul’s best-known words come from his letter to the Romans: ‘Where sin increased, grace multiplied all the more” (5:20). What are some ways God’s grace in your life has exceeded your sin?
5. “All shall be well” is not a statement of happily-ever-after optimism. It’s an eschatological statement affirming that if God can make the killing of his Son into the “still point” of history, what lesser evil can God not also work for good? What are the causes of your tears that you long for God to wipe away?

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About the Contributors

Sandra L. Glahn

In addition to teaching on-campus classes, Dr. Glahn teaches immersive courses in Italy and Great Britain. She is a multi-published author of both fiction and non-fiction, a journalist, and speaker who advocates for thinking that transforms, especially on topics relating to art, marriage, and first-century backgrounds as they relate to gender. Dr. Glahn’s more than twenty-five books reveal her interests in bioethics, sexual ethics, and biblical women. She has also written twelve Bible studies in the Coffee Cup Bible Study series. A regular blogger at Engage, bible.org’s site for women in Christian leadership, Dr. Glahn is also a Substack writer and co-founder of The Visual Museum of Women in Christianity. She is married to Gary and they have a married daughter and one granddaughter.