Sublime

Julian of Norwich was a fourteenth-century anchoress who lived during one of the worst centuries in human history. The black death wiped out more than half of the population of Norwich. Famines and floods were worse than anything in memory. Wars ravaged the land, and wandering mercenaries ravaged its people. The church was roiled by corruption. The

The Reformation was Europe's first mass-media news event. The quantity of books and pamphlets generated by interest in Luther's teaching was quite phenomenal. It has been estimated that between 1518 and 1526 something approaching eight million copies of religious tracts were placed on the market.30 This was a very one-sided contest. Luther and his

The sacrificial misreading of the Gospels made the various phases of Christian culture possible. In the Middle Ages, for instance, Gospel principles were superficially reconciled with the aristocratic ethics of personal honor and revenge. With the Renaissance, this edifice began