Women Mystics:
Guides in the Life of Prayer

Dr. Jane Williams together with well-known practitioners of prayer and theology will lead a six-talk series on their favourite women mystics.

Special Series

The WCCM has years of evidence that people long for guides and companions in our journey with God. Yet so much Church practice and theology tell us about God without necessarily helping us to meet God, or to trust what it is that we do when we pray and meditate. In this series we will encounter some of the most courageous and revolutionary adventurers in the life of prayer. Hildegard of Bingen, Catherine of Siena, Julian of Norwich, Teresa of Avila, Therese of Lisieux and Evelyn Underhill each in her own way lived profoundly from the reality of God, encountered in prayer. Each wrote for their own time and to deepen and test their own experience and practice of living with and for God, but their advice about and descriptions of what they learned have provided maps to the pathways of the spiritual life for all succeeding generations.

The speakers who will introduce each ‘mystic’ are all themselves practitioners of prayer and theology. They will lead us through the very different contexts and styles of these fearless women of God, and help us to see both similarities and differences in approach.

Each session will be held, as is appropriate, in the context of a shared meditation, for those who would like to enter more fully into the world that these women mystics inhabit.

The series will be hosted each week by Jane Williams.

Leader

Jane Williams

Jane Williams is the McDonald Professor of Theology at St Mellitus College, a theological college of the Church of England. She is the author of a number of books, including The Art of Christmas (SPCK, 2021) and, most recently, The Sacraments: Responding to God’s Loving Invitation (SPCK York Courses, November 2024).

£120

£ 100

Opportunity to meditate at the start of each session
Time to interact with the speakers
Unlimited access to recordings
Registration form at bottom of page

Schedule of Dates & Speakers

8 May

Catherine of Siena

Presenter: Dr Jane Williams

Catherine of Siena (1347-1380), despite her youth and her lay status, was hugely influential in her time. The Church in her day was deeply divided, driven by powerful political interests and scandal. Catherine’s spiritual authority was recognised by princes, cardinals and popes and she was somehow able to continue to love the Church, while seeing its terrible failings. Her theological and spiritual writings – she would not have understood the distinction – are fresh and lively, beloved of linguists as well as theologians.

12 June

Hildegard of Bingen

Presenter: Beverley Mayne Kienzle

Hildegard of Bingen (1098-1179), a Benedictine nun, superior of three women’s communities (Disibodenberg, Rupertsberg, Eibingen) and foundress of the latter two houses, spent her life immersed in Scripture. She composed three visionary treatises: Scivias (Know the Ways), Liber uite meritorum (The Book of the Rewards of Life), and Liber diuinorum operum (The Book of Divine Works); Homilies on the Gospels (Expositiones euangeliorum); over 300 letters; the first extant morality play; medical works; the liturgical songs of the Symphonia; and commentaries.

3 July

Teresa of Avila

Presenter: Julienne McLean

Teresa of Avila – Teresa of Avila (1515-81), the founder of the Reformed branch of the Carmelite Order, was a “late-bloomer.” After years as a mediocre nun, a conversion she experienced about 1560 led her to write about her life (the Vida), initiate her reform, and also to write classic accounts of the mystical life, such as The Interior Castle.

18 September

Julian of Norwich

Presenter: Dr Louise Nelstrop

Julian of Norwich (c. 1343 – after 1416) was an English anchoress of the Middle Ages. Her writings, now known as Revelations of Divine Love, are the earliest surviving English-language works attributed to a woman.

Despite the attempts of scholarship to uncover her particulars, “Julian’s life,” wrote Fr Robert Llewelyn, “has passed largely into obscurity, and no doubt this is how she would have wished it. ‘You shall soon forget me,’ she writes, ‘(and do so that I shall not hinder you) and behold Jesus who is teacher of all.'”

What is known about her is her remarkable book, The Revelations of Love, an account of and the fruit of twenty years’ reflection on a series of visions which revealed to Julian the depths of God’s unconditioned love for us in Jesus Christ.

30 October

Teresa of Lisieux

Presenter: Dr Sr Gemma Simmonds CJ

Saint Thérèse of Lisieux, (1873-1897), or ‘The Little Flower of Jesus’, was a Discalced Carmelite whose spiritual writings emphasize finding holiness through simple, everyday acts of love. Canonized in 1925, she became one of the most popular saints in the modern Catholic Church and is often thought of as the advocate of a simple, childlike spirituality. Her writings, heavily edited after her death by her Carmelite sisters, reveal in their original version a far more complex personality and spiritual teaching.

27 November

Evelyn Underhill

Presenter: Prof. Robyn Wrigley-Carr

Evelyn Underhill (1875 –1941) was a poet and novelist as well as a pacifist and mystic known for her numerous works on religion and spiritual practice, in particular Christian mysticism. Her best-known work is Mysticism, published in 1911.. Evelyn Underhill wrote 39 books and hundreds of articles and reviews. In this presentation, Robyn will focus on Underhill’s later, more mature writings, particularly her retreat talks.

What's Included

Q&A with the Speakers

In each talk, you will have the opportunity to ask questions to the speaker

Access to Recordings

By registering, you'll be given access to the talks' recordings

Meet Fellow Meditators

Whatever the stage of your journey meet fellow meditators with whom to reflect and share your thoughts about this series in a safe environment

Meditate Together

We offer the opportunity to meditate together at the start of each session

Full Series Registration

Single Session Registration

Concessions

The prices reflect the need to achieve self sufficiency. Therefore if you’re able to give a little more we would be very grateful. Please, click here to donate.

If you need a concession please let us know. We do not turn anybody away for lack of resources. Please click the email address support@wccm.org to contact us.

Registration

Women Mystics: Guides in the Life of Prayer