The Beguines

"There are among us women whom we have no idea what to call, ordinary women or nuns, because they live neither in the world nor out of it. Franciscan Friar Gilbert of Tournai, 1274." During the late twelfth century there was a turn that established a woman's role in her religious society. They began teasing the idea of living outside of the normal societal sphere and create one of their own. Many women were open to …

…Medieval Culture (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1969), 133. Mitchell, Nathan. Cult and Controversy: The Worship of the Eucharist Outside Mass (N.Y.: Pueblo, 1982) Southern, Richard William. Western Society and the Church in the Middle Ages (London: Penguin, 1970) Stoner, Abby. Sisters Between. http://userwww.sfsu.edu/~epf/1995/beguine.html Acessed March 24, 2005 Wiethaus, Ulrike. "Sexuality, Gender, and the Body in Late Medieval Women's Spirituality: Cases from Germany and the Netherlands." Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion 7, Spring 1991.