(1193-1258). Founder of the feast of Corpus Christi, Juliana was born at Retinne near Liege to wealthy parents. Orphaned at the age of five, she was educated at a hospice for lepers in Mont-Cornillon, where she became prioress in 1222. As her anonymous biographer recounts, Juliana’s life was marked by numerous crises that forced her to leave the hospice in 1242 and again in 1247-48. Together with a few trusted women friends, she spent the remaining years as a wandering beguine, a Cistercian nun, and finally a recluse. In 1246, Juliana and Prior John composed the Office for Corpus Christi; on June 6, 1247, the feast was celebrated for the first time in Liege; it was officially endorsed in 1264 by Pope Urban IV, with a new Office composed by Thomas Aquinas. A local cult in Juliana’s honor was authorized by the Vatican in 1869.
Juliana’s vita displays few individualistic traits besides her difficult life circumstances and accounts of her caritas. Although descriptions of extraordinary mystical feats are lacking, Juliana’s spirituality follows generally the paradigmatic pattern of holy women of her era, especially in the form of prolonged and extreme fasting, intense devotion to the eucharist, visualizations of Christ’s Passion, and reverence for the priesthood. It is therefore hard to establish how accurately Juliana’s biographer captured this remarkable woman.
Ulrike Wiethaus
[See also: MYSTICISM; WOMEN, RELIGIOUS EXPERIENCE OF]
Newman, Barbara, trans. The Life of Juliana of Mont Cornillon. Toronto: Peregrina, 1990.
Roisin, Simone. L ’hagiographie cistercienne dans le diocese de Liege au Xllle siecle. Louvain:
Bibliotheque de l’Universite, 1947.
Voosen, E. “Sainte Julienne de Cornillon.” Collectiana namurcenses 26(1922):248-71.
World History
