Nothing gets the ire up on a reformation minded Christian like when one brings up Mary. You know… Mary the virgin mother of Jesus. While praying to Mary as an intermediary is something I cannot accept, I think there is a tremendous gift given to us from those in our past who celebrated Mary as the Mother of our Lord. In the Middle Ages, the Virgin Mary was taking a more prominent place in the western church. Mary became an important symbol for a truth that many of us reap the benefit of today. Mary, being a woman, a woman of ignoble birth, who would have been discredited in her culture because of the ‘unusual’ circumstances of her pregnancy came to be an inspiration to thousands of Christians not just because she was the Mother of Jesus but because she, like them, was a normal everyday person, with no upper class distinction or wealth whom the God of the universe chose to birth His incarnate Son through! Mary represented to several classes of ordinary people that this God whom they worshiped was not just for the upper class, the people with privilege, rather for everyone. Women in general did not have much power in the culture and especially in the church. The twist on the Apostle Paul’s words about women being silent in the Church and that a woman should never teach a man was very established.
Meet Hildegard von Bingen. Hildegard was the tenth child born to a fairly well-to-do family in the 11th century and was dedicated to the Church. She was a person who experienced a variety of supernatural visions and as a result it seems, God gave her a great deal of favor and authority in the Church. She, in fact, started her own Abby (two of them) which were in practice, quite autonomous from the monasteries. No longer did she want her nuns to be mere handmaids to the monks earning a reputation as a ‘bitch’. She cried out for passionate, pure devotion to the Lord and challenged Bishop, Pope and Emperor alike to not only wax eloquently about the faith but to LIVE it! She was sought by Kings and Queens throughout Europe and had such favor that to censure her would be a serious career impediment! Hildegard, with great fire would chastise in writing the Emperor Frederick for his meddling in Church politics and installing Popes who would be more of a puppet to the empire. Frederick was trying to re-unite Germany and breathe new life into the western Roman Empire. ‘You juvenile fool’ she chastised and proceeded to prophesy the judgment of God against him and his certain defeat. This action would have normally resulted in execution or imprisonment but not for Hildegard. The defeat indeed happened eight years later in 1176 in the Battle of Legnano - the first time in history where cavalry was defeated by infantry!
Hildegard taught things like the following:
- In God there exists an almost erotic relationship of feminine and masculine. Mirrored in the complementary relationship of men and women.
- Contrary to the clear position of St. Paul, man was made for woman just as equally as woman was made for man.
- Opposing St. Augustine’s doctrine, sexual pleasure is not a result of sin, should not be equated with guilt, and would have been present in Paradise before the Fall.
- Eve was far more the victim of Satan’s cunning than the cause of Adam’s sin and the fall from grace.
- Menstruation doesn’t make a woman unclean, but the shedding of blood in warfare most certainly renders a soldier unclean.
- Was a new voice in support of childrens rights.
These teachings infuriated much of the establishment! To say she ruffled feathers would be a gross understatement! Amazingly she was allowed to continue and made several preaching tours. This was a ‘no- no’ for women in the day but Hildegard didn’t seem to care. So respected was Hildegard that she was given sanctioned opportunity to speak in one of the largest Cathedrals in the region! She preached to capacity crowds in the Cathedral of Trier whose foundations were laid in the fourth century by Constantine!
God used Hildegard’s life and passion to challenge a patriarchal system and was the beginning of women’s voices to contibrute in an official way to the life and health of the Church. She was a voice that would echo in the 1600’s from the lips of reformers but remember, she spoke them origionally in the 12th century! Radical indeed! Another way in which God used a ’simple’ woman to impact the world and our faith by making way for all people to participate in the Kingdom of God, regardless of gender or class! This is one reason why Mary matters!
