Thursday, January 4, 2024

It is the 4th of January 2024. Welcome to the Christian History Almanac, brought to you by 1517 at 1517.org; I’m Dan van Voorhis.

Like many in the Medieval world, we don’t know a lot about the woman who has come down to us as “Angela de (of) Foligno.” But what we do know of this woman is rather remarkable given that 1) she’s a woman in the Middle Ages and 2) she may have been illiterate. But remember, “illiterate” doesn’t mean dumb- it means she never learned to read or write because she didn’t have to, but she was certainly conversant in theology. In fact, she was so conversant in theology that she was given a title that needs to be taken in the best possible sense: she was called “mistress of the Theologians.” Perhaps best understood as “lady theologian”… “a woman who was a theologian.”

Very little is known about Angela when she burst on the scene in 1285 at the age of 37. We know she was from Foligno, an Italian village in central Italy, just south of Assisi. Francis of Assisi died about 25 years before Angela, so his theology and the new “Franciscan order” were all the rage.

Angela may have been the daughter of nobility; she may have been married into money; nevertheless, we know that she, by her own account, lived something of a profligate lifestyle, indulging her senses and wandering from the faith of her family. She claims that anger, pride, gossip, and some unmentionable sin drove her to a Franciscan priest who absolved her, and she became zealous about her faith. And then, in 1288, her husband, two sons, and mother all died. She decided to follow the path of St. Francis, sell off her land and possessions, and serve the poor. As a woman, this was suicide; she would have no recourse beyond the very bare necessities. She would become a Franciscan Tertiary. The “tertiary” is a “third thing,” neither a monk nor a nun- this “third order” consisted of lay people who choose to live according to a monastic rule.

And it was Angela who insisted that her fellow sisters didn’t live in an enclosure- that is, they were Franciscans but took a vow of solitude, instead living amongst the poor they served.

But it is her singular work, collected and printed together, that has made her famous. Her Franciscan confessor would take dictation from Angela. Part of her work is spiritual autobiography, reflections on theology, and reports of her own visions and experiences. In an age when women were not theologians, the primary means of theological expression for women came through mystics. It should be noted that she was an explicitly “Christian Mystic.” She was critical of the so-called “Free Spirits,” and by having her confessor write, he was able to submit her works for theological review. While they were approved, this doesn’t verify what she wrote, but rather that they contained no erroneous doctrine.

The French Catholic philosopher Ernest Hello wrote: “The Life of Angela is a drama whose theatre is the Ineffable.”  “Ineffable” means, literally, something we cannot speak of. It doesn’t mean it's not true- it’s just unverifiable. But it is, if nothing else, arresting prose. Consider this excerpt from the introduction by the author's scribe.

From beyond came the salutation winged by a seraph “with eyes shining like candles.” Quickened by the fiery glance, I heard the summons; trembling inwardly, I began the task, the transmission of the Book of the Blessed Angela de Foligno, which contains some of the most excessive and volcanic passages in all of Christian mystical literature”. After years of laboring close to the conflagration- licked by the flames but not consumed- it is with fear and reverence that I pass on the text, one meant to set ablaze “the sons and daughters who are in the world, who are on this side of the sea or beyond it.”

Borrowing from the Song of Solomon it uses romantic language and sensual language to express the delight she takes in her union with Christ through the Holy Spirit. She borrows heavily from Paul and 1st Corinthians in her parallel imagery of her thorn in the flesh and her weakness amplifying Christ’s goodness. The curious collection of teachings, letters, poems, and experiences has been recently translated into English from a critical text in the Classics of Western Spirituality series. Angela De Foligno, in the pantheon of medieval mystics from this one text, died on the 4th of January in 1309.

The last word for today is from the daily lectionary- from Psalm 110, a Psalm applied by Jesus to himself.

The Lord says to my lord:

“Sit at my right hand
    until I make your enemies

    a footstool for your feet.”

The Lord will extend your mighty scepter from Zion, saying,

    “Rule in the midst of your enemies!”

Your troops will be willing

    on your day of battle.


Arrayed in holy splendor,

    your young men will come to you

    like dew from the morning’s womb.

The Lord has sworn

    and will not change his mind:


“You are a priest forever,

    in the order of Melchizedek.”

This has been the Christian History Almanac for the 4th of January 2024 brought to you by 1517 at 1517.org.

The show is produced by a man “inwardly trembling” as he engineers this “excessive and volcanic” show, Christopher Gillespie.

The show is written and read by a man who knows he’s old because the text I noted as “recently published” was in 1992, and I stand by that description. That was just a few years ago. I’m Dan van Voorhis.

You can catch us here every day- and remember that the rumors of grace, forgiveness, and the redemption of all things are true…. Everything is going to be ok.