Saint Augustine of Hippo 354 - 430

Medieval History 101

 

The Wacky World of Margery Kempe

Margery Kempe was an Englishwoman who was born in approximately 1373. Despite her illiteracy, she is believed to have dictated the very first autobiography.

 

Ms. Kempe is now viewed as possibly being bipolar, though at the time she was seen as being extremely crazy. She had a deep love for Jesus Christ and left her life behind to preach the Bible, though she had never actually read it herself. She drew the ire of the church, not only because she was a layperson trying to preach to others, but also because her understanding of the Bible did not align with the beliefs at the time.

When Margery decided that she had to make a pilgrimage to the Holy Lands, she found a group to travel with. Her constant weeping and bizarre behavior grated on her fellow pilgrims, who abandoned her. At the time, roving bands of outlaws raped and pillaged unfortunate travelers who wandered outside city walls. That was why pilgrims traveled in groups. Abandoning Margery was seen as a possible death sentence for her. When she arrived unmolested and alive at the next city, her fellow pilgrims believed that meant that she was sainted. They quickly grew to overlook her unpleasantness and allowed her to rejoin the group.

Despite the fact that Margery dictated these stories herself, they are widely believed to be true. Many others repeated these stories and she was seen as being a Saint in her lifetime. Officially, however, only the Anglican Church of England recognizes her as a Saint.

 

How Do You Solve a Problem Like Macrina?

Everything we think we know about nuns and monastic life today was actually created by a lesser known Saint from the 300s- Macrina the Younger. 

 

Prior to Macrina, nuns were expected to be virgins and virtuous from the very beginning. Nunneries would not accept a widowed woman or anyone who might have come into their religious awakening late in life. Macrina actually was a virgin when she joined a convent, but coming from a wealthy family, she was forbidden from taking vows by her father. He betrothed her to a similarly wealthy young man from another prosperous family who passed away before they were actually old enough to marry.

Macrina took advantage of the situation; while her father sought another young suitor for her, she declared herself a "spiritual widow," since she had been betrothed to another. Her father gave into her wishes and she eventually setup a convent of her own. In her thinking, however, a woman (or anyone for that matter) could become a virgin by taking vows and becoming chaste. As long as someone committed to it, one could join her convent.

 

Eventually, her widowed mother would join Macrina, becoming a nun in Macrina's convent after Macrina's father passed away. Oddly enough, despite her father's reluctance, Macrina's family would have three saints in it- Saint Basil, Saint Gregory of Nyssa and herself. Her brother's hagiography of her life would cement her religious achievements. While she has become a lesser known Saint these days in the western world, she is a hugely popular one in the Eastern Orthodox Church.