Together on the Journey:
A Weekly Blog
For the last two weeks at Church by Candlelight, we have been spending time with two women in our church calendar that we don’t always get to honour: Catherine of Siena and Julian of Norwich.
Catherine of Siena (feast day April 29) was from Italy and spent her short life caring for the sick and working for peace. She died at the age of 33 in the year 1380. Julian of Norwich (feast day May 8) was from England and lived most of her life in a small hermitage attached to a church where people would come and visit her for spiritual direction. She was a prolific writer whose words are as meaningful today as they were then. She died around the year 1417.
Full disclosure, Julian of Norwich is one of my favourite saints. I love that we remember her because of her writing, reading, and desire to be alone, except for the company of a cat. If there isn’t already a patron saint of introverts, then Julian should be it.
As far as saints go, these two women were practically contemporaries, having died only about 40 years apart. However, they were very different people and served God in very different ways. And yet we remember both of them. The tale of these two women reminds me that if it was possible for them to serve God in different ways, and both ways are held up as good, then it’s possible for us to serve God in different ways too. Not everyone is called to serve God in the same way, and this is a good thing, because we need a variety of gifts in the Kingdom. The important thing is that we show up and serve in whatever way we were gifted with.
The church calendar is filled with many of these lesser-known saints who all, in their own way, served God in their own times and places. And it’s wonderful to spend time with them and be taught by them. In many ways they were just like us, ordinary people called to do extraordinary things. And so, let us remember them, not because they were extraordinary but because they were ordinary. Real people, called to serve God and God’s Kingdom. Amen.
– Jess