In Praise of Holy Women

is not an optional extra; it comes with the force of a commandment:
'You shall be holy, for I am holy.' (1 Peter 1:16; cf Lev 11:45, 20:26, 21:8)
In this issue, five authors – three Anglicans and two Orthodox – look at
five contemporary women – one Anglican, two Roman Catholics and two
Orthodox – all of whom aimed to fulfil the commandment to be holy. Only
one of the five women has been canonised. The other four are simply ‘doers
of the word, and not hearers only’ [James 1:22]. Caroline Walton on Julia de
Beausobre, shows that attaining to holiness, one encounters what appears
to be an insurmountable obstacle – that quintessential blockade called ‘the
Cross’; it always involves suffering, but refusing to draw back from it, in
what Beausobre calls ‘creative suffering’, leads surprisingly to such joy and
freedom that the present reality begins to lose its grip on us. Like a woman
giving birth – a classic metaphor for suffering – inescapable pain is followed
by wondrous joy. Sister Mary Michael writing on Thérèse of Liseux, will not
let us, however, exhaust women’s contribution with mere metaphors. ‘There
is no respect for us poor, wretched women anywhere’, St Thérèse writes;
‘And yet you’ll find the love of God much more common among women than
among men, and the women during the Passion showed much more courage
than the Apostles….’ In our feature article on Sister Joanna [Reitlinger], a
nun-iconographer, who in her chosen profession as an artist is continually
repudiating self-importance, holiness begins essentially with an encounter
with Christ. This marks the advent of a decisive winter thaw: the world
loses its frozen grip on us, and we become aware, if only momentarily,
of the other, Christ-sown, spiritual reality. Spiritual work then begins in
earnest as we endeavour, with God's help, to reclaim the original image of
God in us (distorted by idolatry of self) as we now ‘strain forward’ (Phil
3:13) to embrace Christ's likeness, while he in turn manifests to the world
our uniqueness. Philip Gorski writes on the Anglican mystic and scholar,
Evelyn Underhill, who, ‘speaking from profound personal experience’ while
swimming mightily against the academic, mainstream, theological currents
of her time, develops the theme of contemplative prayer as practised by
St Paul and continued by monastics and contemplatives down through
the ages as the highway to holiness. ‘Holiness is not sinlessness’ is one of
Sergii Bulgakov's remarks, meaning we are not obliged to become holy
before holiness takes up residence in those practicing ongoing repentance
and service to fellow pilgrims, as Jim Forest demonstrates in his article
on Dorothy Day, whose contemplation opened out in social action. A holy
person, he tells us quite simply is someone ‘who in a remarkable way, shows
us what it means to follow Christ.’
Christopher Mark CSWG
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