“This beautiful word ‘mother’ is so sweet and kind in itself that it cannot be attributed to anyone but God.” With these words, Julian offers us an amazing and foundational statement. She is not saying that the most beloved attributes of motherhood can analogously be applied to God, although I am sure she would agree they could. She is saying much more—that the very word mother is so definitive and beautiful in most people’s experience (not everybody’s, I must add) that it evokes, at its best, what we mean by God. This perspective is not what most of the world’s religions have taught or believed up to now—except for the mystics. Among these, Julian of Norwich stands as pivotal. Continue...here.
-- Mirabai Starr, on the medieval mystic Julian of Norwich
