Contemplation in the Shadowlands
Having finished the record of Margery Kempe last year and bits of St. Hildegard intermittently, I find myself fascinated — and, consequently — plunged into the fascination of the medieval female mystics. While I'm technically a newcomer, I simply cannot get enough. I find their writings total respite from the concerns and fears so prevalent (moreso with the strife of Time) in this world. This life is so very brief and, while blessed, burdened with the looming actuality that I am truly "...but dust." I'm thankful for trials as without them, the Deception of this age might conceal my own mortality; this Valley I presently walk is truly a Shadowland, and Pain is, as C. S. Lewis put so aptly, "...a megaphone to rouse a deaf world." So, I am onto Julian or Norwich's Revelations of Divine Love and, again, what a breath of fresh air; as I pray throughout the text, reading its content is like ceaseless prayer. I feel vastly undisciplined in the area of con...