Thought for the Day

May 08, 2025

“All shall be well.”

I’ve been exploring the idea of slow living, a movement which seeks to quietly reject late-stage capitalism by focussing on paying attention to the rhythm of the seasons, spending more time in nature and less time plugged into social media and our phones. It’s a concept which encourages us to embrace the present moment.

Which is all very well if you have the time and finances to step away. For most people, living is about being on a hamster wheel of work and busyness that we can’t seem to get off even if we want to.

To reject the prevailing mindset of our culture, feels impossible, but this is partly what Christians are called to do. Today is the feast day of Julian of Norwich, my favourite theologian, and the ultimate example of stepping away from the world.

Julian lived in the late 14th and early 15th century, and she was an anchoress, an early form of Christian monasticism like that of a hermit, except anchorites took vows which consecrated their lifelong withdrawal from the world. They chose to be permanently enclosed in a cell, communicating with people only through a small opening.

The vows they took were similar to the funeral rite, symbolising that this withdrawal from the secular world was regarded as a type of death. From the moment Mother Julian was enclosed in her cell, she was symbolically dead to the world.

Jesus taught that death was the way to feel truly alive, and this didn’t just mean a promise for a future, eternal life, but a death of self and ego which would enrich life here and now, in the present moment.

Julian understood this all too well. Her most famous quote, “but all shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well,” grounds us to the present moment, in a troubling world where all is not well. Somehow, in ways we can’t understand, God will have the last word.

Sadly, it’s not possible for me to live out the anchorite dream as Julian of Norwich did. Like most people, I can’t just step away from the things which trouble me, to become dead to the world and all its pain. But, All shall be well is more than just a platitude. It’s a challenge to surrender, to acknowledge that, whether we are people of faith or not, we don’t have the control over the universe that perhaps we wish we did.

All shall be well is a powerful exhortation to live in the world without being destroyed by it, with hope as an anchor. God has the last word, and that word is love.

~ Written for the Thought for the Day segment on the Today programme on BBC Radio 4. Broadcast on May 8th 2025.