I Julian

I recently read Claire Gilbert’s “I Julian”. It is a fictional autobiography of Julian of Norwich – if there can be such a thing! But the book demonstrated for me that there can – as Claire Gilbert’s skilful retelling of the imagined story of Julian of Norwich as from Julian’s own perspective offered plenty of food for thought and inspiration. It was well worth the read, offering a moving account of the very likely life and thoughts of Julian of Norwich. It certainly provokes the reader to reflect on the immensity of God’s love – “the failures are what make me, forge me, teach me, that if God loves me so much in my failures and my trying then I must love that child, that young woman, that weakling of a hermit that I am. Jesu thanks me, not for my success, but for my failure and my trying.”