Revelations of Divine Love by of Norwich Julian
CHAPTER XXXVIII
676 words | Chapter 45
In Heaven "the token of sin is turned to worship."--_Examples thereof_
Also God shewed that sin shall be no shame to man, but worship. For
right as to every sin is answering a pain by truth, right so for every
sin, to the same soul is given a bliss by love: right as diverse sins
are punished with diverse pains according as they be grievous, right so
shall they be rewarded with diverse joys in Heaven according as they
have been painful and sorrowful to the soul in earth. For the soul that
shall come to Heaven is precious to God, and the place so worshipful
that the goodness of God suffereth never that soul to sin that shall
come there without that the which sin shall be rewarded; and it is made
known without end, and blissfully restored by overpassing worship.
For in this Sight mine understanding was lifted up into Heaven, and
then God brought merrily to my mind David, and others in the Old Law
without number; and in the New Law He brought to my mind first Mary
Magdalene, Peter and Paul, and those of Inde;[1] and Saint John of
Beverley[2]; and others also without number: how they are known in the
Church in earth with their sins, and it is to them no shame, but all is
turned for them to worship. And therefore our courteous Lord sheweth
[it thus] for them here in part like as it is there in fulness: for
there the token of sin is turned to worship.
And Saint John of Beverley, our Lord shewed him full highly, in
comfort to us for homeliness; and brought to my mind how he is a dear
neighbour,[3] and of our knowing. And God called him _Saint John of
Beverley_ plainly as we do, and that with a most glad sweet cheer,
shewing that he is a full high saint in Heaven in His sight, and a
blissful. And with this he made mention that in his youth and in his
tender age he was a dearworthy servant to God, greatly God loving and
dreading, and yet God suffered him to fall, mercifully keeping him that
he perished not, nor lost no time. And afterward God raised him to
manifold more grace, and by the contrition and meekness that he had in
his living, God hath given him in Heaven manifold joys, overpassing
that [which] he should have had if he had not fallen. And that this is
sooth, God sheweth in earth with plenteous miracles doing about his
body continually.
And all this was to make us glad and merry in love.
[1] S. Thomas and S. Jude. According to tradition the Gospel was
carried to India by these Apostles.
[2] S. John of Beverley was consecrated Bishop of Hexham in 687,
and was afterwards Archbishop of York. "He founded the monastery of
Beverley in the midst of the wood called Deira, among the ruins of the
deserted Roman settlement of Pentuaria. This monastery, like so many
others of the Anglo-Saxons, was a double community of monks and nuns.
In 718 John retired for the remaining years of his life to Beverley,
where he died in 721 on the 7th of May.... He was canonised in 1037.
Henschenius the Bollandist, in the second tome of May, has published
books of the miracles wrought at the relicks of St John of Beverley
written by eye-witnesses. His sacred bones were honourably translated
into the church of Alfric, Archbishop of York, in 1037. A feast in
honour of his translation was kept on the 25th of October."--Alban
Butler's _Lives of the Saints_, etc.
Perhaps the fact that the Saint's original Feast Day of the 7th of
May occurred on the second day of Julian's illness, had something to
do with his being brought to her mind a few days after with so much
vividness.
[3] "and browte to mynd how he is an hende neybor and of our
knowyng"--_i.e._ he was a countryman of our own. "hende" = near,
urbane, gentle.
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