Imitatio Transvesti: Margery Kempe as a Transgender Saint

"Why gost thu in white? 
Art thu a mayden?"

Book of Margery Kempe

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Vs. the Vicar of Norwich

Between 1415 and 1418, the trans virgin encounters regular conflicts on account of living out the Imago Transvesti, resulting in a series of struggles that offer a model of life for Christians and those called to live Imitatio Transvesti. Whereas the trans saint is lives in relative peace while abroad, where she is a stranger in a stranger land, once she returns to her home country of England, where knows the language, she begins to teach and debate. Abroad, people may merely observe her. At home, people hear her preaching the virtues of her Imitatio Transvesti and causing others to follow it. She moves beyond a wonder to be observed to a social revolution to be reckoned. Three episodes make up the primary contest between the trans virgin and local authorities, collectively producing a drama in the hagiography as the way of the world, the Imitatio Mundi, and the way of the trans saint, Imitatio Transvesti, are brought into contrast and conflict. The first event occurs in late 1415 in Norwich with a Vicar. The second event occurs in 1417 with the Mayor of Leicester. The third event occurs in late 1417 with the Archbishop of York. Through these conflicts, the Imitatio Transvesti of the Book of Margery Kempe follows in the late medieval scholastic tradition of dialectic argument. Whereas Marinos’s tale is more passive in its resistance to Imago Mundi, the model Kempe provides shows a more active way of living Imago Transvesti. Centuries later, whereas the passive trans monk is accepted as an official saint, the active trans virgin remains contentious. Yet too few medievalists know about Marinos, Kempe maintains a more active fame or infamy. The active Imitatio Transvesti refuses to go away, even by being quietly tolerated and integrated. In this way, Kempe’s model insists that even if society does not like who she is and what she does, it will have to deal with transvestism as a part of the world.

Arriving in Norwich in May 1415, Kempe visits the vicar of St. Stephan's Church, Richard Caister, who interrogates her on her trans identification as a virgin. The Vicar begins their relation combatively, asking, "wher sche had don hir chylde the whech was begotyn and born whil sche was owte, as he had herd seyde" (where she had her child, the one she had conceived and given birth to while she was away, as he had heard). [1] Inverting assumptions, the Vicar suggests that far from being a virgin, she has conceived a child while away. Above all, she is not what she says. Thus, he concludes, she should not present herself as a virgin or face further slander.[2] Ever Slander and scandal remains the cutting edge of the world's threat against trans saints. If she will not return to the gender norms asserted by the Imago Mundi, worse assignment will be made for her. Returning to England, Kempe is better prepared for the wonder of those living under other images of Creation than her Imago Dei. Openly reaffirming her testimony, "sche had in hym how it was owr Lordys wyl that sche schulde be clad in white clothyng" (she showed him how it was our Lord willed that she should be clad in white clothing), and says, “Ser, I make no fors so that God be plesyd therwyth” ('Sir, I make no falsehood and God is pleased with me).[3] Imago Dei may seem false to a world asserting contrary rules, yet the trans virgin commits no lie, laying out her history and revelations for all to see. When ever then the Vicar does not consent but asks for a fellow clergyman to asses her, she at last rejects their authority under the command from God, "I wil not that thu be governyd be hym" (I will not have you be governed by him).[4] A woman once with divided loyalty now affirms she is on the Imago Dei even if the world is not.

Indeed, in the years following her return to England, the trans virgin demonstrates her willingness to undergo struggles to inspire others to join in the Imitatio Transvesti. On Good Friday, 1415, Kempe prays to be vindicated and revived publicly. She asks that if it is God’s will that she be clad in white, that God should grant her a sign of lightning, thunder, and rain, "so that it hyndir ne noy no thyng that I unworthy may the rathyr fulfillyn thy wil" (so that no one can say nothing about me being unworthy, but rather that I fulfill your will).[5] God receives her prayer and confirms that it will be fulfilled on the third day. And so it was. On the next Friday, early in the morning, as she lay in her bed, she saw great lightning, she heard great thunder, and great rain following, and just as quickly it went away again. Kempe recieves this as a sign to once again take on her white clothes, "sche purposyd hir fullych to weryn white clothis," (she intended to fulfill wearing white clothes).[6] Eventually, Kempe keeps this promise. As with the show of the storm, the white clothes again attract attention. The Book accounts, "sche was howselyd al in white, and sithen hath sche sufferyd meche despyte and meche schame in many dyvers cuntreys, cyteys, and townys, thankyd be God of alle" (she was all in white, and suffered much despisement and shame in many counties, cities, and towns, thanks to the God of all).[7] Becoming sainted means to be set apart, a living image of God's diverse creation that inspires others into action. Yet this Imago Dei often contradicts the rules of the Imago Mundi. People have negative reactions causing her to become a target time and again. This is all a part of the imitation of Christ, who also suffered. In this way, the Imitatio Transvesti follows the Imitatio Christi, that by suffering may a saint face the persecution of the world in the name of grace.

The trans saint as an imitation of Christ draws others to follow likewise to see and enact such an image. Once she committed to wearing white in Norwich, the problem arouse that she had no money to buy clothes.[8] God promises to provide. Shortly, Kempe meets a good man of Norwich that welcomed her gladly and sat listening to her stories. Kempe shares with him her need for a loan to buy white clothes.[9] Not only does he offer financial assistance, he directly labors to make her Imago Transvesti materially possible. The Book accounts that this good man bought white clothe and from it made her a gown and a hood, a girdle, and a cloak.[10] By her contingent neediness, being marginalized by her poverty, the trans saint brings others along with her on her way. By his work, the man not only assists in Kempe's embodiment of the Imago Dei, he participates in it. When he arrives with the clothing, Kempe and the man share a revelry in the Imago Transvesti, "he browt hir this clothyng and gaf it hir for Goddys lofe, and meche mor goodnes dede to hir for owr Lordys lofe" (He brought her this clothing and gave it to her for God's life, and much more goodness did for her on behalf of our Lord's life).[11] By returning to the Imitatio Transvesti, the trans saints brings another to the Imitatio Christi. Both revel in God through the shared work of embodying Imago Transvesti. With Kempe and Marinos, Aristotle’s definition of tragedy succinctly describes how public contests of the Imitatio Transvesti inspire public resistance, “an imitation not only of a complete action, but of events inspiring fear or pity.”[12] Through the series of legal contest, the Imitatio Transvesti occurs to bring justice for the trans community and to liberate the cis community from destructive divisions and limits. 

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Vs. the Mayor of Leicester

A significant example of this occurs in the summer of 1417, when Kemp'e encounter with the Mayor of Leicester. Having witnessed the trans virgin in her white clothes, the Major begs her to tell him, "why thow gost in white clothys, for I trowe thow art comyn hedyr to han awey owr wyvys fro us and ledyn hem wyth the" (why you go about in white clothes, because I have truly heard that you come here to take away out wives from us and lead them with you).[13] The Imitatio Transvesti destablizes the rules asserted by the Imago Mundi, including the role of wives. If a wife can assert her identity as a virgin and liberate herself of her husband, others may follow. The danger she poses does not go unnoticed by those who hold privileged positions in the Imago Mundi and want society to continue to imitate its gender norms. As a result, the trans virgin begins to become the target for a wide variety of attacks. Because of the religious nature of her Imago Dei, Kempe refuses to divulge her story to a secular leader, even a patriarchy like the Mayor. Perhaps as the daughter of a prominent Mayor in Lynn may have made Kempe wary of the man's attempts to manage her. The trans virgin deflects the Major's moves by insisting that she would only share her Imago Transvesti with religious authorities. "Syr," she says, "ye schal not wetyn of my mowth why I go in white clothys; ye arn not worthy to wetyn it. But, ser, I wil tellyn it to thes worthy clerkys wyth good wil be the maner of confessyon " (Sir, you will not learn from my mouth why I go about in white clothes; you are not worthy to hear it. But, sir, I will tell it to these worthy clergymen in the manner of a confession).[14] By pivoting from a worldly to a religious authority, Kempe proves that she has nothing to hide nor is she afraid of speaking truth to the patriarchy.

The trans virgin is careful however to maintain the religious blessing over her mission as protection from secular threats. The story the trans saint tells is the same hagiography of the white clothes the Book describes. Kempe tells an Abbot, a Friar, a Clerk, and others about her transition while on pilgrimage, "how owr Lord be revelacyon warnyd hir and bad hir weryn white clothys er sche cam at Jerusalem" (how our Lord by revelation warned her and bade her to wear white clothes before she came to Jerusalem).[15] By couching the story of her transition within the physical journey of a pilgrimage, Kempe makes the embodiment of the Imago Dei easier to process. Furthermore, even if the clergy are not aware yet that Kempe (and her Book) are telling a hagiography, they will understand the religious narrative of pilgrimage.

By getting the clergy to hear her story and repeat it to others, the trans virgin not only authorizes herself within the Church against allegations from secular threats but trains members of the Church to imitate her storytelling. To be a trans virgin saint , Kempe not only needs to tell her own story, performing herself publically Imitatio Transvesti, but to get others to tell her story. This is what comes of the clergy hearing her tale of transition. Before the clergy, Kempe instructs, "therfor, serys, yyf the meyr wil wetyn why I go in whyte, ye may seye, yyf yow likyth, that my gostly faderys byddyn me gon so, and than schal ye make no lesynggys ne he schal not knowe the trewth" (therefore, sirs, if the Major will learn why I go in white, you may say, if you like, that my clergy bid me to go in such a way, and then shall you make no lies nor shall hide the truth).[16] By first embodying her Imitatio Transvesti, Kempe has elicited an audience of storytellers that might repeat (in imitation of her performance narration) the truths of her Imago Transvesti. Thus, the invisible revelation of the Image Dei will be repeatedly performed in imitated by others. By confirming the clergy as her apostles, like Christ sending his followers to tell the Good News, Kempe is no longer alone in an invisible truth or visible marginalization but has her sainthood affirmed by a multitude of sources. "So the clerkys clepyd up agen the meyr and teldyn hym in cownsel that hir gostly faderys had chargyd hir to weryn white clothis and sche had bowndyn hir to her obediens" recounts the Book (so the clerks went to the Mayor and told him in consul how the clergy had charged her to wear white clothes and that she should be obedient to her mission).[17] Once abandoned, Kempe is no longer on her own. Set apart by society, trans saints nonetheless can regain community through imitators, allies and storytellers.

With the clergy behind her, Kempe is able to assert the validity of her Imago Transvesti from God, telling anyone who questions, "thei han chargyd me that I schulde gon thus, for thei dar not don ageyn my felyngys for dred of God" (they have charged me that I should go thus, for they dare not go against my feelings of dread of God).[18] In the end, the Imago Dei validates the trans virgin not only as one set apart from the Imago Mundi but sainted so as to offer a unique a Imitatio Transvesti for others to follow. The conscience of Kempe is proven clean. She has told no lie, although she contradicts the known truth of the city and reveals more to God's creation. In response to overwhelming support, the Major is forced to concede his Imago Mundi to Kempe's Imago Transvesti. In reconciliation, the Mayor meets with Kempe once again. During the meeting, he offers her a hug. Then he offers her some words of comfort. From this time and for a while, the Mayor proves to be a good friend to the trans virgin.

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Vs. the Archbishop of York

The biggest test of the trans virgin comes in York, where Kempe call on allies who have shared in her story and may rehearse its validity. In late 1417, as Kempe was weeping in Church, the Archbishop of York, Henry Bowet inquires who she is. "Why gost thu in white? Art thu a mayden?" asks the Archbishop. [19] Kempe replies tactfully, "Nay, ser, I am no mayden; I am a wife." The Archbishop jumps to condemn her as a liar, ordering her to be taken away by his men to be manacled, "for sche was a fals heretyke" (for she was a false heretic)[20]. At this point, Kempe resists, "I am non heretyke, ne ye schal non preve me" (I am no heretic, nor will you prove me one). While in white, living as a virgin, she nonetheless answers truthfully about her history as a mother. This seeming contradiction is not the same as a lie. She is open and direct on the complexity of her life. She gave birth to children. She was a mother. These are facts of life that other virgins do not share; distinguishing how a trans virgin's life may differ from other virgins.  As a protector of the Imago Mundi, the Archbishop fears that allowing the trans virgin to move and speak freely in York will destabilize gender roles in medieval society. The Archbishop and his consul agree she must leave, "for the pepil hath gret feyth in hir dalyawnce, and peraventur sche myth pervertyn summe of hem" (for the people have great faith in her visions and by adventure she might pervert some of them).[21] They command that she swear on the Bible that she will leave and never return to York. Kempe refuses and insists on the freedom to travel freely to be among the people. Again, the danger of the trans virgin is not only that she embodies an Imago Transvesti outside the control of the Imago Mundi, but that she might inspire an Imitatio Transvesti thus creating more in the image of the trans saint.

In order to discredit the Imitatio Transvesti, the Archbishop summons a host of agents to imitate his version of the truth. Clerks as well as a monk and a doctor arrive. The doctor had examined Kempe before and knew her bodily state. With a party of authorities following the Archbishop’s Imitatio Mundi, York was sent into uproar against the woman in white. The Book accounts, "Sum of the pepil askyd whedyr sche wer a Cristen woman er a Jewe; sum seyd sche was a good woman, and sum seyd nay" (Some of the people asked whether she was a Christian or a Jew; some said she was a good woman and some said not).[22] The couple of lines here mirror one another, underlining the suspicion that she is a Jew with her being bad. The general effect was that Kempe became the subject of marvel and alien to the community. The force of Imago Mundi was forcing Kempe toward the margins, as a woman set apart not by grace but by exclusion.  To counter this, Kempe asked for permission to raise her own witnesses for her defense. When the Archbishop remains intrenched, she asks him to give some time in the city to collect evidence to support her, "for I must teryin and spekyn wyth good men er I go, and I must, ser, wyth yowr leve, gon to Brydlyngton and spekyn wyth my confessor, a good man, the whech was the good priowrys confessor that is now canonysed" (For I must go and speak with good men and I must, sir, with your leave, go to Brydlyngton and speak with my confessor, a good man, who recently became a Canon).[23] Kempe is successful in this request and is able to block some of the slander by mounting her own society of defense, including a letter from her old confessor validating the revelation of the Imago Transvesti and her living out the Imitatio Transvesti. Credits procured, Kempe is once again free to move about York. Trans saints inspire imitation in allies, who enact Mimesis by fighting “as if” the attack were on them.[24] As with Marinos, Augustine’s words reflect how the Imitatio Transvesti in the Book of Margery Kempe, “Let them be an example unto the faithful by living before them and stirring them up to imitation.”[25]

Thus, if the Archbishop cannot get rid of her, he moves to stop Kempe from telling her story, "ne techyn ne chalengyn the pepil" (not to teach nor to challenge the people).[26] Kempe flatly refuses. "Nay, syr, I schal not sweryn," she saus, "for I schal spekyn of God and undirnemyn hem that sweryn gret othys whersoevyr I go " (No sir, I shall no swear, for I shall speak of God and in His name sway others wherever I go).[27] Kempe then adds that scripture attests that women were allowed to hear Christ, follow Christ, speak of Christ, and Christ blessed them. Then the Clerks began attacking her on the grounds of her preaching the Word of God, citing letters from Saint Paul that forbids women to act as a priest, that no woman should preach.[28]  To this Kempe replied that she was not guilty of preaching because preaching is defined as reading from scripture and she was illiterate, unable to read. "I preche not, ser," she says, "I come in no pulpytt. I use but comownycacyon and good wordys, and that wil I do whil I leve" (I preach not sir, I came in no pulpit. I use but common knowledge and good words, as I am allowed).[29] Unable to read, Kempe’s mode of learning and teaching is through imitation. This truth confirms Kempe's previous statements when she was interrogated on the doctrines of faith and answered readily, "wythowtyn any gret stody so that he myth not blamyn hir" (without any great study so that he might not blame her).[30] Kempe's replies were unstudied. Rather, all her knowledge of scripture comes either from listening to clergy, especially her confessors, or by revelation. Indeed, time and again, Kempe's Imitatio Transvesti aims at justifying itself not by written authority but by embodied and experienced truths.

Through repeated performance and the imitation of allies, the trans saint wears down the Imago Mundi. After hearing her defense time and again, as well as the words of allies who authorize and repeat her story, at last the Archbishop surrenders his assault and gives her some money for her troubles.[31] Struggle after struggle, Kempe both imitates previous trans saints and creates a model of imitation. Over the centuries, readers continue to read trans hagiographies and become trans saints because of ongoing problems in the world’s limited definitions of gender, as well as through the continuation of a tradition of reclaiming the image and mode of life through the transitioning of gender identity and expression. This is especially true in the late Middle Ages, as women such as Margery Kempe look back to older stories in order to find alternatives to unlivable conditions. Indeed, by modeling itself on the trans hagiographies of the early Christian period, the Book of the Margery Kempe adapted an image and a model for later generations. “Such efforts to mold herself on the examples of holy women anticipate a practice that would become more common by the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries…” writes Verini. “Such acts suggest that Margery’s imitation of female exemplars was the forerunner of a practice of female imitation that adumbrated a larger web of female interconnections.”[32] Yet this interconnection goes beyond femaleness, existing in the space between and across. The trans monk and the trans virgin share commonalities, even similar genitalia, but what bonds them is a shared struggle, a mutual liberation, and a continuing narrative that builds on those that have come before and lay the seeds for future transitions.

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Part 1: Imago Transvesti: 

Margery Kempe as a Transgender Saint

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Notes

[1] BMK 2419-21.
[2] Ibid.
[3] Ibid. 2427-9.
[4] Ibid. 2430-1.
[5] Ibid. 2433-4.
[6] Ibid. 2436-41.
[7] Ibid. 2453-6.
[8] Ibid. 2433-56.
[9] Ibid.
[10] Ibid.
[11] Ibid. 2447-56.
[12] Aristotle Poetics. I.xi.
[13] BMK 2727-28
[14] Ibid. 2720-31.
[15] Ibid. 2732-5.
[16] Ibid. 2737-40.
[17] Ibid. 2740-2.
[18] Ibid. 2735-40.
[19] Ibid. 2923-4
[20] Ibid.
[21] Ibid. 3023
[22] Ibid. 2934.
[23] Ibid. 2960-3.
[24] Gebauer and Christoph Wulf 1.
[25] Augustine. Confessions. XXI.xiii
[26] BMK 2963-4.
[27] Ibid. 2964-72.
[28] Ibid. 2972-3031.
[29] Ibid. 2975-7.
[30] Ibid. 2943-9.
[31] Ibid. 3023-3028.
[32] Verini 384.

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Introducing Margery Kempe: 

The Wife of Lynn’s Tale 

Lynn Festival Fringe Production

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Imago Transvesti: Margery Kempe as a Transgender Saint

"Ser, I have non hows to put hir 
inne les than I putte hir among men. "

Book of Margery Kempe

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As a genre of embodiment and literature, hagiography creates continuity through diversity. Evident generic features exist across time but are embodied uniquely and personally. Each saint may be said to be set apart Imago Dei but each image is distinct. Likewise, the Imago Mundi that the saint turns away from changes over time. Each saint may be a model for Imitatio Christi, yet lived in different ways and circumstances. Thus, while lives and stories may be composed in association with trans hagiographic texts, the process and ends of each may be unique. Thus, whether or not Margery Kempe is recognized as a saint by the Catholic or Orthodox churches, nonetheless her Book constructs a hagiography that clearly models Kempe according to saints and sections of the narrative according to saints’ lives, following in the tradition of Imago Transvesti and Imitatio Transvesti as modeled by “the Life of St. Marinos the Monk.” Between 1413 and 1415, Kempe is traveling through the Holy Land and Rome, during which time she is given a persistent Imago Transvesti. In a vision, she is living as a trans virgin, transforming the image of herself from a mother (as the world has assigned her to be) to a virgin (as God commanded). The transition from mother to virgin is embodied not only by the exchange of clothing, dark colors for hues of white, but from the locomotion of the travel. Quite literally, on the road she is more free and boundaries of identity more fluid. Also, Jerusalem and Rome, the centers of Christian world, function to re-center the trans saint. In England, often shown on the margins of the medieval Mappa Mundi, Kempe is marginalized for her revelations from God and later for her trans virginity. Moving from the margins to the center coincides with her movement from the Imago Mundi, the image of her worldly self, to the Imago Dei, God’s image of her.

Around the summer of 1413, the Imago Transvesti is given to Kempe in a vision, wherein God commands her to go on pilgrimage, promising her freedom and protection if she will mark herself as an Imago Dei by wearing white clothes. God commands, "dowtyr, I sey to the I wyl that thu were clothys of whyte and non other colowr, for thu schal ben arayd aftyr my wyl" (Daughter, I say to you that I will that you be in clothes of white and no other color, for you will be arrayed after my will).[1] White clothes on a woman are a medieval signifier of virginity. Kempe worries over her embodiment; marked by years of childbearing. While Genesis 1.27 asserts that God creates humanity in a divine image, including gender, "creavit Deus hominem ad imaginem suam ad imaginem Dei creavit illum masculum et feminam creavit eos" (God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them), the medieval Imago Dei must combat the Imago Mundi and the gender culture assigns.[2] Wearing white, Kempe would be insisting that the Imago Dei that God has set in her heart (virginity) is more true than the truth assigned to her body (motherhood). The motherhood may have been the will of her husband and the world, but the virginity is the will of God. The radicalness of this supernatural command is evident in the phrase, "whyte and non other colowr." God is clarifying that Kempe would be taking on the identity of a virgin and rejecting her identity as a mother. The color of the one identity will not be seen in the other. The function of clothes is to assert identity markers in ways that usually hide or overrule the body. The body may be suggested but not seen when clothes is covering it. No word is given from God that her body will be changed but rather its meaning will be reassigned and overruled by the clothing.

The Imago Transvesti often contradicts the assigned genders of the world. For fear of embodying this contradiction and the battles her body would have to suffer as a result, Kempe pleads to God, "A, der Lord, yf I go arayd on other maner than other chast women don, I drede that the pepyl wyl slawndyr me. Thei wyl sey I am an ypocryt and wondryn upon me" (Dear Lord, if I go arrayed as a virgin, I dread people will slander me. They will say I am a hypocrite and stare at me).[3] A medieval woman, Kempe is aware of how clothing signifies distinct gender identities, between men and women, as well as between women. Virgins wear certain clothes to identify themselves, wives others clothes. To wear white clothes would be to declare that she is a virgin. One may transition from the identity of virgin to mother but not from mother to virgin. Kempe fears the scorn that comes from such a transition, particularly being a hypocrite. A hypocrite is one who says they are one way and behaves in another way. If Kempe says she is a virgin but has given birth to children, others will say that she is this special kind of liar. Yet this is what God commands in showing her this vision. "Ya, dowtyr," God says, "the mor wondryng that thow hast for my lofe, the mor thu plesyst me" (Yes, daughter, the more they wonder at you as you live the life I command, the more you please me).[4] God is showing her a true revelation of herself as a virgin. So far, this Imago Dei is only visible to her. To embody this Imago Tranvesti, like other trans saints, she would be taking a risk of becoming a target. Yet by embodying the invisible truth of the Imago Transvesti, set apart as a trans saint, Kempe is making the Imago Dei visible to the world. She will be revealing the Imago Transvesti to others as God has revealed it to her and make the world consider the diversity in God's creation.

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Wanting to test the truth of the Imago Transvesti as Imago Dei, Kempe delays for a time until she can get validation of her revelation from the Church. Around 1413, she seeks Bishop Repingdon to affirm the command for her transition. Hearing her plea to wear white as a virgin, the Bishop gives her a discouraging response, " I have take my cownsel, and my cownsel wyl not gyf me to professe yow in so synguler a clothyng wythowtyn bettyr avysement" (I have considered with consul, and my consul will not allow me to affirm that you should wear such clothing without better advisement).[5] The repetition of the word "consul" affirms how Kempe's Imago Dei is elided, marginalized, and bound by the discourse of the world. Society affirms that she is a wife and mother. Social norms are that mothers do not wear white. The Bishop is not willing to take a risk on an Imago Transvesti that he cannot see and contradict the Imago Mundi he can see. Where the Bishop keeps the question open is in allowing Kempe to go on the commanded pilgrimage that she might prove the truth of her Imago Dei by living it. The Bishop allows, "ye sey be the grace of God ye wyl go to Jerusalem. Therfor prayth to God that it may abyden tyl ye come fro Jerusalem that ye be bettyr prevyd and knowyn" (You see by the grace of God that you will go to Jerusalem. Therefore pray to God that you may abide until you come back from Jerusalem with better proof and knowledge).[6] Pilgrimages by their difficulty were used as tests of unseen graces. Like how many trans persons describe transition as a journey, the work of turning the invisible Imago Dei into a visible embodiment takes time and effort. In other words, the Bishop insists that he will only believe what he can see. If Kempe embodies and lives the narrative of trans virginity on pilgrimage, the Imago Transvesti will be given a form the Bishop cannot deny.

The vision of the Imago Transvesti can be revealed, transitions are often not a smooth process full of starts, stops, and set-backs. Kempe does set off on pilgrimage, yet not until the summer of 1414. Rejected by fellow pilgrims, Kempe prays to for help. In reply, God again gives her a command and a vision of herself as a virgin, " I schal ordeyn for the ryth wel and bryng the in safté to Rome and hom ageyn into Inglond wythowtyn ony velany of thi body yyf thow wilt be clad in white clothys and weryn hem as I seyd to the whil thu wer in Inglond" (I will ordain your wellness and bring you safely to Rome and home to England without any violence, if you will wear the white clothes I instructed of you while you were in England).[7] As is common in saint's lives, Imago Dei arrive when saints are at their most vulnerable. Rather than being a threat to her wellness, the Imago Transvesti becomes the mode by which her wellness is ordained and assured.  The trans saint of this hagiography, Kempe accepts the invisible truth of the Imago Transvesti, although she fears she will now be called a liar and hypocrite. To this worry, God assures, "I am the spirit of God... Thu fondist me nevyr deceyvabyl, ne I bid the no thyng do but that whech is worshep to God and profyte to thy sowle yyf thu wilt do theraftyr" (I am the spirit of God... you found me never deceptive, now I bid you nothing but what is good to God and profitable to your soul if you will follow me hereafter).[8] Often trans persons are accused of being in disguise, yet their insistence of demonstrates authenticity over time. Saints are called hypocrites for contradicting the way of the world, but are vindicated by the end of their stories. Marinos is rejected by his community on charges of hypocrisy, yet he is vindicated in the end by God. Marking Kempe as such a saint, God promises Kempe that her story will follow likewise.

There is a critical difference between the truth of Imago Mundi that it is made and reasoned from other true things while Imago Dei are revealed by the Creator of Logos. If as Augustine writes in "De Trinitatae”, “in the soul of man… [is] that image of the Creator,” then the truth of the Imago Dei within Kempe is true although it is not yet seen. [9]If she embodies the Imago Transvesti, the charges of inconstancy will fall before the constant image of truth God makes of her. The promises of God and creature found in the Imago Transvesti prove true over the course of the pilgrimage from Jerusalem to Rome. Shortly after praying and receiving the revelation of the Imago Dei once again, Kempe discovers an Irishman with a bent back who speaks English named Richard. Although he is uncertain of the truth and wisdom of the Image she shares with him of their journey, Kempe is able to convince him through her persistence and insistence of God's truth. Occurring in private revelation remains consistent, yet delayed until Kempe changes enough in person and circumstance to be able to transition. To the surprise of many, including Richard and the group of pilgrims who had abandoned her in Jerusalem, Kempe and her friend arrives safely in Rome. There, Kempe commits to being constant to her word as well and makes moves to transition. When in Rome, Kempe ordered white clothes and wore them "as sche was comawndyd for to do yerys beforn in hir sowle be revelacyon, and now it was fulfilt in effect” (as it was commanded years before in her revelation, so it was now fulfilled).[10] In committing herself to the Imago Transvesti, Kempe "fulfilt" several promises. God's Imago Dei is proven, the Bishop contingency is answered, Kempe's promise is fulfilled. In England, the established order could not see the truth in her Imago Transvesti, yet in Rome it has become visible for all to see. 

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Once the Imago Mundi is seen beside the Imago Dei, society becomes jealous. Soon after transitioning, Kempe became the target for a local priest, " He steryd meche pepyl agen hir and seyd mech evyl of hir, for sche weryd white clothyng mor than other dedyn whech wer holyar and bettyr than evyr was sche as hym thowt" (He stirred many people against her and said much evil of her on account of her white clothing; as if she deemed herself holier and better than others, he thought).[11] The revelation of Imago Transvesti can conflict with the world that rejects it. Imago Mundi establish values and norms, setting certain embodiments in the center of its world and others on the margins. Imago Dei asserts a vision of the world where the margins can be centers of their own. As Kempe is told to reject all color from her white clothes, so the world feels the force of her rejection. Imago Mundi that judged and condemns her, now fears that she will judge. The secret of the Imago Dei in hagiographies is its constant insistence through the mutable Imago Mundi that can draw the saint into inconstancy. When in Rome, Kempe is introduced to a Dutch priest who convinces her to confess to him. He asks her, will you do as I bid? [12] Yes, she replies. Having set her up with a promise to submit to any of his instructions, the priest charges her to leave her white clothes and wear black clothes. Kempe submits to the priest as an authority of the world and God, " than had sche felyng that sche plesyd God wyth hir obediens" (then had the feeling she pleased God with her obedience).[13] For Kempe, norms are stronger when voiced by a churchman, when the Imago Mundi and Dei can purport to speak in one voice. Yet readers know the conflict. Bound by a new promise in contradiction to the old, Kempe is caught between Imago Mundi and Imago Dei; each asserting claims, insisting on her constancy and loyalty.

Having abandoned normate motherhood and then trans virginity, Kempe is ridiculed for betraying both her masters. She has fallen into the position described in Matthew 6:24, "nemo potest duobus dominis servire aut enim unum odio habebit et alterum diliget aut unum sustinebit et alterum contemnet non potestis" (No man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other).[14] Just as Jesus is describing the jealous conflict between the worldly and divine, Kempe finds herself serving different masters who are giving her conflicting commands and images of herself. The transition back to a wife was most felt as a betrayal by those who had affirmed her virginity. Her friends in Rome could not understand why she gave up on the Imago Transvesti, asked her she had been robbed. No, she replied, then fled Rome. On the road, she runs into one of the priests that had opposed her transition to virgin and smugly applauds that she realized the foolishness of her Imago Transvesti, "he enjoyid gretly that sche was put fro hir wille and seyd unto hir, 'I am glad that ye gon in blak clothyng" (He greatly enjoyed she had been taken away from her previous choice and said, 'I am glad you have gone back to black clothing').[15] At the disappointment of her friends in Rome and the satisfaction of a man she considered her enemy, Kempe began to reconsider her choices. Before the priest could move on, she told him, "Ser, owyr Lord wer not displesyd thow I weryd whyte clothys, for he wyl that I do so" (Sir, our Lord was not displeased that I wore white clothes, for her wills that I do so).[16] The Imago Dei has not abandoned her, and she has not entirely abandoned her Imago Dei. After submitting to the Imago Mundi, Kempe's life becomes more inconstant and full of conflict as Imago Transvesti constantly continues to assert its primacy.

In the end, Imago Transvesti wins out against the inconstancy of Imago Mundi by asserting the constancy that Augustine describes, “if it is made after the image of God …certainly it always is.” Given her lack of peace during her return to her worldly identity as a mother it is not surprising that upon her return to Rome Kempe also returns to her virgin identity. The Book testifies that while she was in Rome a little before Christmas, our Lord Jesus Christ commanded her, “to gon to hir gostly fadyr, Wenslawe be name, and byddyn hym gevyn hir leve to weryn ageyn hir white clothys" (to go to her confessor, Wenslawe by name, and bid him give her leave to wear her white clothes again).[17] Location and locomotion continues to function as representative of transition. Movement destabilizes her but Rome reasserts the fixity of Imago Transvesti. While she moves, Rome does not. While she changes, the Imago Transvesti does not.  While before she confused the Imago Mundi and the Imago Dei as acting in the same voice, the voice of Christ disrupts and divides this conflation. In the end, the command from God overrules the command from a priest, "whan sche teld hym the wyl of owr Lord, he durst not onys sey nay. And so weryd sche white clothys evyr aftyr"(when she told him the will of our Lord, he dared not say 'no.' And so she would wear white clothes ever after).[18] The jealous match between Imago Mundi and Imago Dei concludes here as Kempe comes to understand that obedience to the church is not always the same as obedience to God, especially when the church becomes the enforcer to worldly gender norms at conflict with Imago Transvesti. Imago Dei of Genesis may be used time and again to assert gender binaries and divisions yet are undone by living out the failure of these social constructs and experiencing the persistence of trans truths.

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Part 2: Imitatio Transvesti: 

Margery Kempe as a Transgender Saint

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Note

[1] Staley 728-3.
[2] Genesis 1.27.
[3] Staley 733-5.
[4] Ibid. 735-6
[5] Ibid. 796-9.
[6] Ibid. 799.
[7] Ibid. 1758-61.
[8] Ibid. 1756
[9] Augustine. The Trinity. Stephen McKenna trans. 6.874.
[10] Staley 1854.
[11] Ibid. 1960-3
[12] Ibid. 1966-99.
[13] Ibid.
[14] Biblia Sacra Vulgata (Vulgate): Holy Bible in Latin. “Matthew.” 6:24. Stuttgart, Germany: German Bible Society, 2007. Print.
[15] Staley 1966-99.
[16] Ibid.
[17] Ibid. 2136-8.
[18] Ibid. 2136-40.

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Pilgrimage to Norwich: Finding A Little Room with Julian of Norwich

"He shewed a littil thing 
the quantitye of an hesil nutt...
What may this be? 
And it was generally answered thus: 
It is all that is made."

The Showings of Julian of Norwich

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Shortly after moving to Maine, I was taking the kids for a walk and exploring our new town while the Reverend got some time alone in our new house. While going along the street towards the local businesses, a member of the church (one I had not yet met) slowed down and hailed us. Our conversation was brief but amounted to them interrogating me about where I was taking the kids. I said that we were just going for a walk. They looked me up and down. Okay, they said and drove away. Further down the road, another car stopped. This time it was a police car. They too also wanted to know what I was doing with the kids. I said we were going for a walk. Then they asked me who I was. I explained my relation to them and to the Reverend. The police officer took the kids aside and asked the same thing. Out stories matched (no surprise) but they still asked to speak with the Reverend. We called her and she confirmed that I was her partner and these were our kids. Although I did not get the full story, the officer apologized and explained that a member of the community had called and said a strange person was possibly kidnapping the new Pastor's children. When the officer felt sufficiently that I was indeed one of the children's parents and not a pervert after the children of this quiet Maine town, he let us go. The Reverend called me right away after the cop left and came to pick us up. At home, we got the kids settled. They were shaken but blissfully oblivious to most of what had gone down and why. Then I proceeded up to our bedroom. Not feeling comfortable even there, I went into our large closet and sat down. I began to cry. The Rev stood there for a while but did not ask me to come out or calm down. Instead, she slide into the closet next to me. We sat together for fifteen twenty minutes. Then she went downstairs to start dinner. A little while later I came out as well but during our time in Maine, we never quite left that closet.

The thing about closets that many don't understand: what makes them shameful for transgender and queer persons is not that they are so terrible in and of themselves but that the outside world is that much worse. As an introvert, and a hobbit, I have been drawn to small, soft, enclosed spaces for as long as I can remember. I need to go to my inner room (even if it is only in my mind) to recharge, even after time with pleasant company. As a transgender woman, my need for spaces where I can feel safe and comfortable is even greater. The event of my second week in Maine is just one example of conflict that I have to navigate on a daily basis. Most of these alienating experiences are small but a day out can contain a countless number of them. While most people who know me as a scholar, writing, activist, pastor's wife, or mother treat me with some basic currency of respect, most people don't know me. To 99.99% of folks I encounter on the street, I am a stranger who might be any number of things. Among the images of myself that strangers have indicated to me in one way or another are sex worker (why else am I walking home from the train in the evening, conveniently after work/school gets out?), pedophile (why else would I be sitting at a park bench watching two young children with the watchful eye of a parent?), and drag queen (although this usually comes with ideas on how I might improve my act by wearing more outrageous heels, make-up, and wigs - never mind that I don't wear wigs). People stare, take pictures, bring their children away from or around me in arcs that make it clear to me and others that I am perceived as a threat, or come up to me asking questions from "what are you?" to "how much?" I usually tell them, "a medieval studies professor and about $3,000 per credit hour." This is all to say: there are days in which I don't feel like dealing with that 99.99% of people. Even the library can be a bit much. So I work from home. In my home, I usually have a cozy office, an inner room, a cell, or closet in which I can let my defenses and witty retorts down and focus on other things like raising kids or writing an article. Even now, I am writing from my office/closet.

Finding room was a real concern - for myself as well as my partner and mother - when we were setting off on our pilgrimage. Our week long journey concluded with a trip from Lynn (the home of Margery Kempe) to the little cell which was the home of Julian of Norwich. By this time, visitings over half a dozen cities and half a dozen other sites, we were all a bit tired of the many people who shared space with us there and along the way. Indeed, our trip began in London and threw us into the deep end of dense crowds. As I left the  last New Chaucer Society event to meet my recently arrived travel companions, I had to wade through a marathon of runners cutting across every major direction I needed to pass to get to them. At one point, we had to wait as police officers signaled to my group as we one by one raced across and around runners trying not to collide with any of them. On both sides of the street were dense layers of onlookers watching the marathon or trying - like me - to figure out how to get across the river of humanity. Later on, my mother declared that the beginning of our pilgrimage, London, and the end, Norwich, could not have been more different in regards to crowdedness. "I almost wish we could have just spent the whole week here," she said after our first hour in Norwich. Life proceeded with less urgent and dense intensity in Julian's hometown. Our walk from our car to the Cathedral brought us along the river where our speed slowed and our hearts began first to settle. Agitated from the drive there, we decided at the river to stop for food at the little cafe by the bridge. There my mother ordered oatmeal, while the Reverend and I split a yummy salmon, egg, and wild green salad. The best part of the meal was that until a few minutes prior to leaving, we had the whole cafe to ourselves. Periods of our meal proceeded in silence as we chewed and just enjoyed the quiet. No worry about people staring or cars crashing.

The intensity of the trip had been such and Norwich was such a relief that at our arrival at the Cathedral, where stood a statue with the words of Julian, "All Shall Be Well," the Reverend stopped with a start and began weeping. For some time we stood there. No one asked anyone to move on or to calm down. My fiancee was locked into a private cell of her own heart where these words came to her like the first fingers of dawn. When she began to step back out, she turned to me and then my mother. Her tears turned to laughter. We took each other's hands and turned to go into the Cathedral. Unlike other Cathedrals that followed the more tradition cross shape, the Norwich Cathedral retains and extensively uses additional buildings off to one side which create an encirclement around a grove. Entering the grove requires an almost spiral motion through the exterior buildings, along the Cathedral proper, and back out again. Once in the grotto, one feels as though you are entering into an enclosed sacred space. At the center of the grass is a labrinth that continues the spiral motion towards its middle. Caught in its gravity, the Reverend and I followed the labrinth towards it epicenter. In a way, this path inward reflected the concluding motion of the pilgrimage as a whole. We were around people on all sides but drawn into the steps of the winding way were existed in our own solitary worlds. The labrinth ends at its center, a circle of rest and reflection. At this moment, we were ready to withdraw from the world and into ourselves. Standing there, at the center of my own journey and universe, I slowly began to scan around and see others still on their own journeys. Even my mother who sat on the outside of the grove found rounded indentations in the wall that formed tiny little chapels where she could hide away. Standing there, I could feel a mystery at the heart of Julian of Norwich's ministry and perhaps all pilgrimage as well: we all made this journey together and yet we all made this journey within the solitary cell of our own complexities, tiny labrinths within tiny cathedrals within our hearts all bundled together like a hazelnut. 

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Julian of Norwich is an expert on the little things. In her Showings, or Revelations of Divine Love, Julian describes visions given to her by God. Over a series of showings, Julian sees the value of the little things in the light of the eternal. These visions are life changing for Julian, who later entered into a cell where she lived the remainder of her days, conversing through windows and contemplating God's wisdoms. Her visions were life changing for many others who point to her book as reframing the world and the divine, the changing and the everlasting, into scales that are able to be grasped. Time and space, existence and nothingness, value and grace are all rearranged in her mystic visions of all that is. Julian who lived in a small cell showed others how they might see and affect the great things within the little. Even time for Julian seems a small affair. A lifetime to her is nearly nothing. In chapter three, she writes of being near death at the tender age of thirty, "methought all the time that I had lived here so little and so short, in reward of that endlesse blisse, I thought, nothing" (Julian III.81-82). For a text chiefly concerned with suffering, to call the long duration of pain a "little" and "short" reframes the experience from the groaning expanse of the flesh to the closed affair of mortality in the eternity. Trauma theory has asserted the difference between pain as a thing physically sensed in the body and suffering as a thing understood in the mind. By changing the frame of reference, Julian reduces the body from a world of pleasure and pain into a mere cell in which a child might play at the victories and losses that really take place on a divine scale. In one sense, this is a relief. In another sense, it is too much of a relief. Julian's mindset in the early part of her life is as one who desires more life so that she might suffer more for the sake of God. Time feels almost too small. Compared to the divine temporality, she is but a child playing and worrying of childish things. She longs to be a woman just at an age and a moment when she fears that she may never live long enough to be a woman. 

The most famous little thing of Julian's Showings is her vision of everything. "He shewed a littil thing the quantitye of an hesil nutt in the palme of my hand," writes Julian (IV.144-154). The metaphor of hazelnut anchors her vision in something readers may have experience is life. Readers cannot have touched all that exists but may have touched a nut such as this. Following the metaphor symmetrically, this is a universe the size of a hazelnut, as it is also a hazelnut that contains the whole universe. In other words, by framing everything within the context of a small thing, she raises the honor of smallness. Considering her devotion to God through a life sealed within a cell of a church through the lens of hazelnut, it may be a mystery that she could see the whole universe from within the small room but a magnification of her lived reality to say that her little home contained the mysteries of the universe. Indeed, the universe does not look the same to Julian from the point of view of her flesh as it does from the scale of God. While remaining the same, the world seems of a different character. The known becomes the unknown again. In this way, by becoming small the world becomes more interesting. It begs questioning. "I lokid there upon with eye of my understondyng and thowte, What may this be? And it was generally answered thus: It is all that is made" (IV.144-154). A hazelnut for its size may seem simple yet it may contain mysteries and the thoughts it inspires that last a lifetime. So too if the universe could fit into one's hand, it would contain more than enough for many lifetimes of consideration because of the question it begs. Likewise, the shortness of life that Julian perceives does not make it any less full of suffering or love, truth or mystery. Nor does it assure that a long life comes any closer to truth nor arrives at a justification for the love and pain on receives. And all this might as well be contemplated in a small cell as well or better than in the largeness of the wider world. Small things demand focus. Looking into the depths of things can contain such an eternity as one may find in the vastness of space.

The precariousness of Julian's life at the time of the visions, quaking from the proximity to a near death experience, readers can better understand her anxiety at the vulnerable smallness of the world. She writes, "I mervellid how it might lesten, for methowte it might suddenly have fallen to nowte for littil" (IV.144-154). Traditional assumptions of scale places the largest things in association with everything and the smallest things in association with nothingness. As a small - or at least young - thing herself, Julian may feel that with closeness of death her existence may also be snuffed out. What is a hazelnut in the palm of a comparably large hand? What is she in relation to everything or to eternity? Yet the metaphor of the hazelnut gives some resistance against presumptions about size. The nut is able to be crushed by a larger force but is hard and persistent. In the palm of the hand, as Julian sees the universe, one cannot break a hazelnut merely by squeezing or pinching. The is strength and even power in such a small thing. Although Julian and every other created thing may be precarious in relation to the eternal absolutes, yet within the smallest things exist a seed of eternity, a part of God's being that is as fixed as the whole. "And I was answered in my understondyng," continues Julian, "It lesteth and ever shall, for God loveth it; and so all thing hath the being be the love of God" (IN.144-154). The glory of a thing is not its size or power, nor that it is loving or lovable. Rather, a thing is glorified because of the love given to it. The hazelnut is a small thing but contains the mystery of the universe. Any or all created things may be nothing in contrast to God but are glorified because God loves them. A cell may be a small thing but contains all the world of a saint, therefore turning the little room in a sacred site. A life may be short but is worthy because of the life it contains. 

While bigness serves to put littleness into perspective but as Julian frames it, this does not mean that the small thing is any less honorable. Offering herself as an example, Julian reflects on the effect of God's revelations on her, "This gretenes and this noblyth of the beholdyng of God fulfilled her of reverend drede, and with this she saw hirselfe so litil and so low, so simple and so pore" (VII.237-241). In an egotistical society, we might feel threatened by such remarks. We should want to be large, not small. We should want to be raised on high, not low. We should want to be rich, not wanting. But Julian inverts these values. We are but small things and our suffering is not so large as cannot be overcome. We are not at the top and other truths and authorities may yet intervene. We have less, so we have less over which to worry. Again and again, Julian drives home from the big open spaces with the message that it is in our small places that God comes to us. Julian writes of herself, "thus by this grounde she was fulfillid of grace and of al manner vertues and overpassyth all creatures" (VII.237-241). Not only do the little things not hold the troubles of the big but there are virtues present and concentrated in the small that are lost or diluted in the large. There is a grace that might not be sensed or touched if we do not attend to the small things. We might miss our own value if we gaze only on the big things and do not regard ourselves. Our suffering may be less but is not less valuable. Our suffering is only less when we take on suffering that is not for us to bear alone. At that moment our pain becomes ego. The little ones may be hurt by big pains but should consider them in their particularity. One cannot kill death although one may fight against a deadly disease. One cannot fix mutability although one can wade through change. By knowing the limits of our strength and virtues, we are better able to use them. This may mean that we must stand before the largeness of the world or else focus ourselves within the littleness of a cell or office. This does not ignore or surrender our connection to everything else but it locates us within the small links in the chain of causation. We have much to do and it will be done each little thing.

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Compared to the rest of the pilgrimage, Norwich was a little place that contained precious gifts. Probably the most peaceful place in our whole pilgrimage was sitting in the Julian Center in Norwich. The building is formed around the little church and cell that was Julians home. Finding it drew us away from the granduer of the Cathedral with its shops, tours, and cafeteria. Journeying down a little cobblestone road, we had to search for parking amidst the pockets between trees, gardens, mail boxes, and street lights. This was an unassuming section of Norwich that seemed more like a regular residential block more than a sacred site for pilgrimage. The welcome sign was likewise dainty and bright. Stepping inside it felt like we were entering into our great aunt's parlor, rather than a museum or church. A young woman jumped up when she heard the creaking of our feet on the old floorboards. "Welcome!" she chirped as we began to look around at a wall of bobbles framing a large sitting space with tables and chairs. "Would you like some tea?" Um, was all we could get at out at first. Then uncertainly and some several moments later we added, sure. I began to finger through the books on display while my mother went to the far end of the room where light came streaming into the space. "A garden!" she exclaimed. Putting down a new printing of Julian's "Showings" I joined her before a large wooden door standing open upon a little grove of flowers. This green space was much smaller than the Cathedrals but less intimidating. Also, this time it really was just us. We stood for a while looking and breathing in the fragrant air until we were alerted by a clanking sound behind us. The young woman had returned with a tea set full of cups, saucers, biscuits, milk, sugar, tea bags, and steaming water. She invited us to sit down and enjoy as she took her seat back at the register. No sooner had we all taken our seats, however, than she began to excitedly question us about who we are and why of all the places we might have found ourselves on this morning we were here.

What made our tea time at the Julian Center so delightful was the sense of hospitality and being home in a strange place. Like the tea were were sipping and dipping biscuits into, this peace was steeped by the genuine care our host showed us. A student of a nearby University, she had once had other plans for her study until she traveled to Norwich and fell in love. Her attention on us carried with it that same enjoyment of new things and the curiosity of a student. She made no pretense of what she may have known about Julian, rather she was more interested in what we knew and could teach her about the mystic. She pushed for more information when the Reverend came in from parking the car (it had been tricky finding a place) then we both bought an icon of Julian and Margery Kempe for our offices. We told her about the two women, both mystics, but radically difference in sensibilities. Julian the quite and stationary introvert and Margery the loud and passionate extrovert. Their meeting, described in Kempe's Book, is a scene that could have inspired a medieval version of the odd couple. She wondered about my work in medieval studies. She wondered about the Reverend's work in ministry. She doted on my mother like she was her own. At no point was there a remark or stare about myself or my taking the Reverend's hand that would have suggested that a trans lesbian couple was anything but commonplace here in Norwich. More than our own hotel rooms, which had that comfortable yet professional sterility of a place for those just passing through, the Julian center felt like home. The conversation eased our tensions as the tea brought our enthusiasm back to life. My mother's remark that we should have started at Norwich and stayed there for the whole trip was a sign that we felt renewed, more like we were closer to the start than at the end of our pilgrimage. Compared to the roughness of our arrival in London, we felt more relaxed now than when we began.

The decision to leave the center and enter the place we had come so far to see happened so organically it felt as though the transition happened in silence without a word of interruption. We thanked our host as best we could, then wandered out the front door and down the hill to the chapel entrance. A large basin of holy water greeted us. Dipping my fingers in and dabbing myself in the sign of the cross, I enacted an age old tradition of washing away the dirt of the world in preparation for entrance into an other kind of space. Like the center where we had tea, the church was small and intimate. A few pews, each likely able to see a half dozen at most, lined the aisles. The door to Julian's cell was on the far end, meaning the three of us had to walk down the short length of the Church to get there. While brief, there was a sense of being received. We were entering into something held private and removed from the world. Coming to the door, I felt almost like I was back home at my little closet-office. Yet this is where Julian spent much of her life, receiving visitors from one window facing the garden and receiving mass from the other window (now the door where we stood) facing the chapel. Just off from the center of the room was a stone altar covered over by a white cloth, stationed in front of a hanging crucifix. This is where Julian sat and contemplated Christ's suffering and love. Now it is where visitors sit and contemplate with her. The cell was set up for about a dozen or so sitters. A wooden bench built into the wall ran along three of the four walls. On the wall without the bench, where the door now stood, also was installed a sculpture built into the wall featuring another cruciform and the inscription: Here Dwelt Mother Julian. In front of the sculpture was arrayed a number of blue, red, and purple candles. Interspaced around the candles in a random patten was hazelnuts, signifying Julian's vision of the universe. Like many who came before us down to Julian herself, we sat here for some time, holding and considering the hazelnuts.

This cell marked the end of our formal pilgrimage. Everything after this would be steps taking us back to London and eventually back to the United States. Pilgrimages are funny things. They combine the desire to see the bigness of the world and the desire to become intimate with them. Arriving at the end, we found ourselves in a little cell within a little church within a (relatively) little city and thinking on things as little and as common as hazelnuts. Yet in the spirit of Julian, I cannot minimize our conclusion by saying that it was more about the journey than the destination. Without a place like Norwich, there would have been no journal. There would be no big things without the little things. This little thing made us do a big thing in coming here. We had to leave our homes and our closets, push through crowds (which despite what one might hope was not much less transphobic and ableist than our home in the States) and unfamiliar territories in order to get to this home which is itself little more than a closet. Over the course of that journey, we let go of a lot of pain and anxiety. More pain and anxiety would doubtless come but it would be altered by our journey. Yet we were not eager to move on from this spot. Like we did when we reached the center of the labyrinth, we stayed a while in this spot not wanting to unwind the knot we tied in getting here. As like we did in the grove, we looked around at our fellow travelers. My mother who left family and pets, a job and a garden in Chicago to pack up with her daughter and daughter-in-law on a funny trip. My fiancee who dropped off our children in Chicago with their father (while I flew ahead to NCS), took a leave from work, and packed up her struggles with health in order to blaze ahead on an uncertain path around England. And myself, giving up my cell for the chance to sit in another's. What did this ending mean for each of us? Work, illness, and prejudice awaited us each at home. In ways, it never left our side. Yet we were each a little different. And what's more, our world was a little different. At very least, on a rainy day in July, a trans woman medievalist, her fiancee and queer pastor, and her mother (and soon to be god mother of at least one of her children) occupied the cell of Julian of Norwich. On this day, the history of the medieval mystic and us were bound together as it had become bound with Margery Kempe, the mad mystic from Lynn centuries before. This may be a little thing in comparison to the big events on the timeline but it is immensely valuable.

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Follow us on our journey:

Pilgrimage to Lynn

Pilgrimage to Oxford

Pilgrimage to the Kilns

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