All Will Be Well
By Mary Frances Myler
“All will be well, and all will be well, and all manner of things will be well.” These words settle on the soul like a balm, soothing the mind and anchoring the heart. All will be well.
Julian of Norwich, a Catholic mystic, passes these words down to us in her 14th century text Showings, which recounts her visions of Christ and testifies to the overwhelming love of God. Despite the passage of centuries, Julian’s grace-filled reflections remain incredibly pertinent to the spiritual life today, offering insights on perseverance in prayer, love, and peace.
Like all good spiritual reading, Showings illuminates the Christian spiritual life, and Julian’s meditations center around her relationship with Christ. Her writing captures the richness of faith and the complexity of the spiritual experience. Julian describes her vision of Christ on the cross as, “Living and vivid and hideous and fearful and sweet and lovely.” For Julian, as for us, the spiritual life is at once vibrant and quiet, both intimidating and intimate, an experience of depth that surpasses language.
As Julian recounts her visions of Christ, she reflects on her own spiritual journey and her struggles in faith. Despite feelings of desolation, Julian perseveres in prayer, and she encourages us to do the same. We often think of perseverance in prayer as a struggle; we wrestle with restlessness and search for reassurance, striving to find God through sheer willpower. This kind of perseverance is exhausting and leaves us feeling emptier than before. But Julian reveals a different type of perseverance: surrender to the love of God.
She shares the words of Christ, who says: “Pray wholeheartedly, though it seems to you that this has no savor for you; still it is profitable enough, though you may not feel that. Pray wholeheartedly, though you may feel nothing, though you may see nothing, yes, though you think that you could not, for in dryness and in barrenness, in sickness and in weakness, then is your prayer most pleasing to me, though you think it almost tasteless to you.”
Julian avails herself of God’s love through prayer and her dedication pleases God. Surrendering to the love of God seems easy when we feel connected to Him or when life is going well, but the true measure of our faith is found when we deliberately set aside our uncertainty and turn to prayer. In times of desolation, we must remember that our feelings do not determine God’s love for us. Then, as Julian reminds us, our perseverance becomes more pleasing to God, tasteless though it seems to us, because the surrender to love requires a sacrifice of pride and a reliance on faith.
The spiritual life relies not on sheer willpower or intellectual rigor but on this surrender to the gift of God’s love, to which we respond in kind. Christ reveals this to Julian through the metaphor of a hazelnut. Upon seeing a hazelnut held in the hand, she writes, “I was amazed that the hazelnut could last, for I thought that because of its littleness it would suddenly have fallen to nothing. And I was answered in my understanding: It lasts and always will because God loves it.” If God sustains a small and inconsequential hazelnut, how much more will His incomprehensible love sustain us? Indeed, at each moment of our lives, He loves us into existence and calls us deeper into a relationship of love.
As with the hazelnut, each of Julian’s fears and confusions are met by Christ’s unconditional love. The power of Showings lies in this beautiful dynamic: vulnerability matched with intensely loving words from the Word Himself. This unfailing love, revealed through the person of Christ, leads Julian to frame her narrative as a “revelation of love.”
Julian reflects, “Do you wish to know your Lord’s meaning in this thing? Know it well, love was his meaning. Who reveals it to you? Love. What did he reveal to you? Love. Why did he reveal it to you? For love. Remain in this and you will know more of the same.” The spiritual life cannot exist apart from this encounter with divine love. Love Himself beckons, transforms, redeems, and repairs. Love Himself challenges, seeks, and dwells in our midst. We remain in Him, and He remains in us. We surrender to His love.
In a 2010 general audience, Pope Benedict XVI said of Showings, “Julian of Norwich understood the central message for spiritual life: God is love and it is only if one opens oneself to this love, totally and with total trust, and lets it become one's sole guide in life, that all things are transfigured, true peace and true joy found, and one is able to radiate it.”
Indeed, by surrendering to God’s love, Julian finds radiant joy and abiding peace. Peace can seem like a far-off dream amid the rush of everyday life, the search for answers, and the unknown of the future. Yet, Christ assures Julian, “All will be well, and all will be well, and all manner of things will be well.” This is not a mere platitude or an empty reassurance, but rather a profound truth.
All will be well.
This is not to say all will be easy. Julian tells us, “Christ did not say: You will not be troubled, you will not be belabored, you will not be disquieted; but he said: You will not be overcome.”
In our spiritual journeys, in our everyday lives, we fall short. We suffer. We grapple with loss and anxiety. But all will be well. We find divine companionship in our pain, for Christ transforms tribulation into an experience brimming with grace and love. He redeems all things; He makes all things well. The love of Christ tethers our souls, steadying us amidst the storms of life. In Him alone do we find our rest.
This is Julian’s enduring message for us, a reminder which echoes through the centuries: surrender to the love of God, for He makes all things well. And, although Showings recounts her extraordinary mystical encounter with Christ, the very same Savior waits for us as well. Christ waits for us, hidden in the simplest moments, the greatest joys, the darkest sorrows. He extends the same message of love and peace to us today, calling, as He did to Julian: “My dear darling, I am glad that you have come to me in all your woe. I have always been with you, and now you see me loving, and we are made one in bliss.”
