This is the first poem from a new collection of poetry from Saint Julian Press titled At the Still Point: In Conversation with Saint Julian. You may also listen to this reading of the poem and the poet’s commentary.
✨ THE FIRST DISCLOSURE ~ THE PASSION REVEALED
After Julian of Norwich, The Passion Visions
“Love suffers.
And in suffering, Love saves.”
We may glimpse—if we are willing—
into Christ’s Passion,
and in that revelation, where the Trinity
fills the heart with joy beyond sorrow—
quiet and sudden—light poured into stillness.
In the stillness of divine light,
the veil is gently lifted—
and what is revealed is Christ’s suffering,
given freely in the shape of love.
There may come a time in our life
when we wonder about our place in creation—
why there is pain and suffering in the world
and whether God’s mercy and love truly exist.
What gave birth to it all,
across an ever-expanding universe?
Does what we observe become true?
It is one of our oldest questions—
and a gift of God’s insight.
At the beginning of all insight
there are questions we ask—
to awaken the soul.
A time to wonder and see
something of the unseen and invisible
threads and beauty of creation.
And to discover how humankind
belongs to the eternal mystery,
and is woven into it with grace.
Searching for clarity of sight—
this is where the journey begins.
This is the first insight of many
where creation’s light reflects back
upon the self and soul.
Julian recounts: in the first showing
He appeared before her—
the Lord of Life, wounded and bleeding,
quiet as a lamb given over to love.
His brow was crowned with thorns of sorrow;
His face shone like a mirror of mercy;
His blood flowed outward in a red and radiant stream—
not in wrath but in mercy,
not in anger, but in love.
This grace cannot be grasped, only received.
She saw no judgment in His suffering—only promise.
No punishment—only presence, emptied and open,
drawing all the world into the stillness of compassion.
Love suffers.
And in suffering, Love saves.
He showed her that this is our beginning—
not in strength,
but in the giving away of strength.
That all shall be well not by might,
but by the fullness of divine surrender;
not by power,
but by the nearness of God,
who enters even the darkness with us,
who holds the sorrow of the world
within His own wounded hands.
She saw, too, a small thing—
round as a hazel-nut,
resting in the palm of her hand.
It was little, fragile,
as if it might fall into nothing.
But it did not.
It endures, even now—
because God made it,
because God loves it,
because God keeps it.
This was no vision of grandeur,
but of closeness.
Divine intimacy—
of how all things,
no matter how small,
are held in being
by the kindness of God.
God is the maker of all that is made,
and in all that is made, God dwells.
In us.
In the sorrow.
In the still point where vision opens—
and we become what we behold.
Where we take in what we
are becoming in the Eucharistic Feast,
this blessed sacrament of faith,
where all shall be revealed,
where all shall be healed,
where our will seeks God,
where God’s will seeks us still,
where we never cease from longing,
knowing the fullness of joy,
and our desire flows out
across all creation—
by human sight,
by an inner understanding,
by a spiritual sight indescribable,
resting in our memory of heaven.
The First Disclosure: A Witness of Love in a Time of Disquiet
Introduction
When I sat down to write The First Disclosure ~ The Passion Revealed, I didn’t realize at first that I was entering a form of resistance. I only knew I was following a voice—Julian of Norwich’s—and listening for another. Something quiet but urgent. Something tender. Something like love. Something that bears witness to the pain and passion of Christ himself.
What I discovered wasn't the sort of love you see on postcards or hear in simple hymns. It was the kind of love that bleeds. The kind that doesn’t avoid suffering but walks into it. The kind that stands firm—not with force, but with mercy.
In a time when cruelty is often justified in the name of Law and Order, and when those who suffer are told to earn their worth, this poem became, for me, a form of protest. A sacred act of remembrance.
Theologians like Jürgen Moltmann, Pope Francis, Barbara Holmes, and Willie James Jennings have written deeply about this kind of love—the love that doesn’t dominate but dwells. The kind that meets us in the dark and stays.
That’s the Christ I rediscovered through Julian’s vision: not angry, not condemning, but broken and open, and still offering himself.
“Contemplation becomes the inner technology of survival that allows a people to transcend the limitations of a society that cannot see their worth.”
—Barbara A. Holmes, Joy Unspeakable“Christianity in the Western world lives and moves within a diseased social imagination... what is needed is a revolution of the Christian imagination, one shaped by the deep joining of peoples, by the Jesus who joins.”
—Willie James Jennings, The Christian Imagination
In much of today’s public discourse, we hear the call for Law and Order—a phrase that too often symbolizes control, exclusion, and the silencing of the vulnerable. But the gospel does not begin with Law and Order. It begins with incarnation. With the presence of the Holy Spirit and Christ, God’s mercy enters the places where human systems have failed so many for so long. It is also where our dichotomies conflict—and where they may be reconciled.
Law and Order aim to manage behavior.
God’s justice aims to restore relationship.
Law and Order punish.
God’s mercy heals.
The difference matters—especially for those who, as Howard Thurman said, live with their backs against the wall. Divine justice is not about retribution; it is about renewal. And as Julian and Thurman both understood, Christ does not come to police the boundaries of worthiness, but to cross them entirely—drawing near, pouring out, binding up, and loving what the world too easily discards.
This isn’t a position paper. It’s a prayer, a vision, a remembrance of who Christ is—and who we are invited to become.
Reflection
I didn’t write this poem with politics in mind. I wrote it because I couldn’t stop thinking about love. Not soft love, but the kind that bears the weight of the world. The kind that bleeds and doesn’t leave. The kind that doesn’t call itself great but reveals itself in the smallest, most fragile things.
The type of love that is radical and revolutionary in ways we have yet to imagine.
Julian of Norwich showed me that path. She didn’t describe the Passion of Christ with thunder or wrath. She saw mercy, presence, and love that flowed like blood—not to condemn, but to stay close. That vision stayed with me.
Especially now, when the loudest voices seem to praise strength without compassion and punish the poor while praising the powerful, we hear talk of Law and Order, but not justice. Rules, but not mercy.
Amid all of that, this poem speaks more softly but more powerfully: Look at Christ. Look at what love truly does.
Julian saw him—wounded, bleeding, silent. Not ruling. Not retaliating. Just present. Just with us. “Not in wrath but in love.” That line wrote itself because when I looked, I saw the same.
While writing this, I aimed to quiet the noise. No slogans. No arguments. Just stillness. In that stillness, Christ doesn’t shout. He whispers: You are not alone.
It’s a strange thing to write a protest as a prayer. But that’s what this is.
Not the kind of protest that disrupts traffic or hits the news. The kind that says: kindness is stronger than cruelty. Those small things matter. That mercy, even now, still has the final word.
Julian’s little hazel-nut came to mind. That fragile, weightless thing resting in her hand. Easy to overlook. Easy to dismiss. But it endures—not because it’s strong, but because it’s loved.
That’s the whole mystery right there.
And in a world where immigrants are scapegoated, the poor are blamed for their poverty, and the sick are told to fend for themselves, we need that mystery more than ever.
We need a God who doesn’t just rule from on high but comes down low.
God, who enters the sorrow.
God, who stays in the wound.
God, who is in agony with us.
Who desires our healing.
Who yearns for our kindness, not cruelty.
This isn’t weakness—it’s the deepest form of strength we can know.
So yes, this poem is a devotional piece, but it’s also an act of memory, resistance, and defiance. A gentle way of saying: Here is who God is, and maybe here is who we’re called to be— people of presence, mercy, and love, who don’t ask if others are worthy of love before we give it.
Julian knew this deep in her bones. Amid plague, fear, and control, she still heard God say: All shall be well. And I believe it too. Not as a fairy-tale ending, but as a call to live differently—to love more fiercely—to make that promise real, in whatever small way we can.
That’s what I hope this poem becomes. A remembrance. A stand. A quiet witness to the Christ who chose love over power, and gave us something deeper than certainty: the truth that in suffering, love still saves.
Closing
What Julian saw centuries ago, in her cell, surrounded by silence and sickness, speaks directly to this moment.
Divine love is not distant.
It is not indifferent.
It is not reserved for the worthy.
It endures in broken places.
It binds fragile things.
It refuses to vanish.
If you long for that kind of God—one who stays, one who continues loving—let these words be a resting place.
And when you're ready, keep listening.
The voices below have shaped this vision.
They remind us that all shall be well isn’t just a hope—it’s a sacred defiance.
A quiet faith with space enough for the whole world.
—Ron Starbuck
Publisher, Saint Julian Press, Inc.
Houston, Texas
📚 Saint Julian Press. (2025). The First Disclosure: A Witness of Love in a Time of Disquiet.
© 2025 Saint Julian Press. Poetry & essay publication.
This essay’s presentation was formatted, researched, and fact-checked with assistance from OpenAI’s ChatGPT Plus service, used to verify theological thought, resources, and historical references.
References (APA)
Holmes, B. A. (2017). Joy Unspeakable: Contemplative Practices of the Black Church. Fortress Press.
Jennings, W. J. (2010). The Christian Imagination: Theology and the Origins of Race. Yale University Press.
Moltmann, J. (1993). The Crucified God. Fortress Press. (Original work published 1974)
Pope Francis. (2016). The Name of God is Mercy (O. Ivereigh, Trans.). Random House.
Rutledge, F. (2015). The Crucifixion: Understanding the Death of Jesus Christ. Eerdmans.
Taylor, B. B. (2009). An Altar in the World: A Geography of Faith. HarperOne.
Thurman, H. (1996). Jesus and the Disinherited. Beacon Press. (Original work published 1949)
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