Lenten Book Club: Julian of Norwich and Thomas Merton
You don't have to invent yourself.
Friends,
Much of our lives is spent trying to construct a self strong enough to hold us together. We manage impressions, curate identities, and attempt to become someone stable enough to endure uncertainty. It is exhausting work. And sooner or later, it begins to fail.
Many of you have written to me about the microsermons, saying they helped you see your life differently. This book club is an opportunity to explore those same ideas more deeply, in conversation with two remarkable Christian witnesses.
This Lent, I am cohosting a six-week book club where we will read Julian of Norwich and Thomas Merton—two Christians who describe what happens when God dismantles the false self we construct and gives us a life we no longer have to build.
Julian of Norwich, a 14th-century anchoress, received a series of visions while suffering a near-fatal illness. She recorded them in Revelations of Divine Love, a work of extraordinary theological depth and pastoral tenderness. Her visions reveal a divine love deeper than fear, sin, or death itself.
Thomas Merton, a 20th-century Trappist monk, explored the same reality from another angle. In New Seeds of Contemplation, he argues that much of human suffering arises from the false self—the identity we construct in order to secure ourselves—and that the spiritual life begins when we awaken to the life God gives instead.
These books are not instruction manuals for achieving mystical experiences. They are testimonies to what happens when God reshapes the human heart through grace.
We meet for all six Sundays in Lent on ZOOM at 8:00 PM Eastern.
For details and the Zoom link, visit my other Substack, Christians Anonymous, here:
Most importantly, this is a no-commitment group. You are welcome whether you attend every week or only once. You are welcome whether you have read the material or not. We never ask, “Where have you been?” Only, “We’re glad to see you.”
You do not have to build yourself.
Peace and Love,
Ellis
Rev. Wm. Ellis Oglesby
A Preacher with a Parrot