Julian of Norwich was an anchoress who lived in the English city of Norwich in the Middle Ages (approximately 1343 to sometime after 1416). There is much we do not know about her, including her name (Julian may have been taken from the church, St. Julian’s, in which she was enclosed).
What we do know is that she became deathly ill in 1373 and experienced a series of visions. After she recovered, she recorded these visions first in a short version and later in a longer version known as Revelations of Divine Love.
Although she lived in a period filled with repeated waves of the Black Death, war, uprisings from unemployment, and the burning of heretics, she doesn’t talk about any of this hardship in her writings. Instead, her visions are filled with abundant expressions of God’s love for us and include many illustrations of God as Mother. She emphasizes the importance of becoming one with God through God’s love for us.
It’s not that she didn’t know pain or hardship. In fact, some scholars speculate that she had likely been a wife and mother who lost her family to the Black Death. Rather, her understanding of God’s love and the importance of uniting with God outshined all of the challenges and difficulties she faced.
The Feast day of Julian of Norwich in the church calendar is May 8, so this month seems like a good time to pray with her.
This set of prayers for an Anglican rosary is filled with quotes from her Revelations of Divine Love. All quotes are in quotation marks, and the places where I made modifications to turn them into personal prayers are in italics. (For example, changing “us” to “me.”)
I hope these prayers inspire you to live more fully into God’s love and seek to become ever more united with God.
| Cross: | “God is all that is good, and God has made all that is made, and God loves all that he has made.” “Prayer oneth the soul to God,” so may I ever seek to spend more time in prayer with You. Amen. |
| Invitatory bead: | “God, of your goodness, give me yourself; You are enough for me, and anything less that I could ask for would not do You full honor. And if I ask anything that is less, I shall always lack something, but in You alone I have everything.” |
| Cruciform beads: | “Sin is inevitable, but all shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well… For there is a Force of Love moving through the universe that holds me fast and will never let me go.” |
| Week beads 1-7: | “You loved me before You made me; and Your love has never diminished and never shall.” |
| Invitatory bead: | “God, of your goodness, give me yourself; You are enough for me, and anything less that I could ask for would not do You full honor. And if I ask anything that is less, I shall always lack something, but in You alone I have everything.” |
| Cross: | “The greatest honor we can give Almighty God is to live gladly because of the knowledge of His love.” Help me live each moment of this day with the knowledge of Your love held deeply in my heart and mind. Amen. |
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