St. Francis, Women Mystics & the Question of Suffering

Giotto, St Francis Receives the Stigmata

Today as I was finishing up my sculpture, I started thinking about how we choose to serve humankind and the Divine. It seemed very clear to me that it is a choice. The choice that I have lived with most of my life is to serve through suffering. But this is not the choice I make now. I’ll explain using the example of medieval women mystics.The wonderful scholar, Caroline Walker Bynum, has written extensively on medieval women mystics. Her books Holy Feast and Holy Fast: The Religious Significance of Food to Medieval Women (The New Historicism: Studies in Cultural Poetics) and Jesus as Mother: Studies in the Spirituality of the High Middle Ages (Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, Ucla) changed my life because they helped me identify the path that I had been unconsciously taking. Bynum talks of medieval religious women who cultivated suffering. They rolled in glass and starved themselves to name just a couple of the physical punishments indulged in. It was part of the mystical path of Imitatio Christi. In the medieval period life was extremely hard. There wasn’t much you could do to mitigate suffering. So these mystics embraced suffering and gave it meaning. As Christ suffered on the cross to redeem and heal humanity, so the women would inflict pain and suffering upon themselves believing that through their own suffering humanity would be healed.I think, however, here is a major difference between what Jesus underwent, and what these women mystics underwent. His suffering was God-given. He did not seek it out; he only followed the path that had been laid for him. The medieval mystics, on the other hand put their own will into the matter. They constructed the idea of Imitatio Christi. I’m not saying it’s wrong. I adore these women and their writings. I only wonder how God might have appeared and how they might have served without exercising their will. St. Francis is interesting because he also practiced Imitatio Christi. He cultivated suffering, but he also accepted God-given suffering in his early illness and through receiving the stigmata later in life.I realized while I was sculpting today is that for along time I carried this idea that I had to suffer to serve God. I am not just talking physically either. I was not comfortable with joy and at ease with the calm passage of time. Some how it felt selfish and wrong to be happy when there was so much work to be done to heal the world. But now, this seems incredible hubris to me. I realized that I have released the need to suffer and I chose to serve God and humanity through light rather than through the darkness of suffering. Sculpting today I felt the light and was grateful.You can have an illness and not suffer. For me this is one of the main lessons of St. Francis' life. His stigmata smelled of roses.

Hildegard of Bingen: Illness & God

When I was first introduced to Hildegard of Bingen in 1987, it was a revelation to me. First I was taken by her visions and writing, but it’s the story of her life that has really effected me. Hildegard lived a life of Divine direction. She was the youngest of 10 children and, as was common at the time, was place in a convent at a young age probably to defray costs. It was placement that she had no voice in. Early in her life she had visions. At some point she received a Divine message that she was to write down her visions. When she refused God’s will she became ill, when she wrote she was healed. Later, she had a vision that she was to leave her convent and found her own. Again she refused and again she fell ill. This time she was so sick that she couldn’t even be lifted from her bed. And again, when she accepted her calling she was healed. God literally directed her life.

Much of my life has been about forcing things to happen, pushing for my own desired outcome. But since I became ill with scleroderma, that has gradually changed. God has taught me through my illness to surrender control. Ironically, now even though my life is more limited in some ways because of lower energy and other issues, I am happier and more satisfied with my life. Things, people, guidance, you name it, flow easily into my life because now there is space; space that was filled before with my own pushing, my own foolish will. Now, I wait and God comes. Illness is a road map to the Divine- a precious gift.When I first read Hildegard’s life story I only perceived her connection to God through her mystical visions. But really God spoke to her through every aspect of her life. I am grateful to have account of her life to guide me.

Hildegard of Bingen Sculpture

Etching detail

A couple of people have asked me to post about Hildegard of Bingen, 12th century German mystic and visionary. Today I’ll post about some of my artwork she has inspired; tomorrow I’ll write about Hildegard’s life & why it’s is so important to me.About 20 years ago (Now that in itself is crazy!!) I made sculpture of Hildegard. I was recently looking for the documentation of it and it’s vanished. So, I’m going to describe it here.

The sculpture was of Hildegard undergoing a mystical ecstasy. She was standing naked, writhing in that sweet agony- somewhat akin to this etching detail.I rigged a door in her stomach which when opened, played Hildegard’s music. Inside were stashed my Hildegard drawing series. But the door was locked with a padlock. I placed the key inside her womb. You had to reach up into her birth canal into the womb to get it.

I invited my Medieval Spirituality professor along with my class to view the sculpture. I asked him to open the sculpture. He accepted and found himself sticking his arm up to his elbow into Hildegard’s birth canal in front of a group giggling girls. When the stomach panel was finally unlocked and opened, the sound of the music was shocking. Music entered a charged space. Very dramatic, but also a lot of fun.

UPDATE: I want to say a little bit more about yesterday’s post. When I had that professor stick his hand up into Hildegard’s birth canal. It wasn’t meant as a sexual moment, although it obviously has those overtones. That professor was nervous & self conscious when he did it. He didn’t know what he would find and he knew he was being watched by his class. Hildegard’s womb in the moment of a mystical ecstasy is charged with the Divine. It is the microcosm of the Divine womb, the source of all creative energy. Remember the mystical rule, as above so below. So I meant to evoke the fear that we feel when approaching God: the fear of the unknown and the fear of annihilation. Squatting down and reaching up into an unknown darkness- to me that sounds a lot like entering into the mystical path..

Hildegard of Bingen's Music

I found this charming video of Hildegard's music. It's called Shelf of Walks. It captures something of Hildegard's spirit- especially her ability to see God in the material word. All the other Hildegard entries were so over the top it was painful. I used Hildegard's music as part of a sculptural piece once. I'll post about that tomorrow. Tonight I'm going to work on finishing my sculpture.