Week 3: Women Saints Reading Diary

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Reading A: In the first half of this week's readings, my favorite stories were the ones about Saint Marine and Saint Christine. These two stories have other similar stories in the unit. Many stories were of parents hiding a child in a tower to perform pagan offerings and later being tortured for refusing to convert from Christianity. My favorite of these was the story of Christine. Another common story that was told in different ways was of women disguising themselves as men and joining monastery, later to be accused of impregnating or fornicating with women. My favorite of these stories was the story of Marine/Marina.

The main reason Christine's story stood out to me, more than the other similar stories, was because of how much she went through. While all of these women suffered, I feel like Christine when through the most of any of them. She was tortured by her father, as he tried to kill her time and time again. Then she was also tortured by the judge Dion, as he also tried to kill her again and again. Then she was again tortured by the new Judge Julianus who eventually did kill her, although there were many miracles before he achieved his goal. Still through it all, Christine remained hopeful and faithful to her chosen religion and never renounced her God, even when it would have been much easier and less painful to do so.

(By Francesco Cairo, Painting of Saint Christine)

Marine's story stood out to me also, even though there were numerous stories of women dressing as men to become monks. I like that Marine's father is involved and dresses her a boy so he can stay with her, unlike the story of Pelagien, who runs away from her family to the monastery. I also like, that unlike the Pelagien story, there is more of an explanation on why the monks thought that Marine was the father of the virgin's baby, because she was staying with the family around the time. The last thing I liked more about Marine's story than Pelagien's was that Marine wasn't just imprisoned and died, but she raised the baby as her own once she was cast out of the monastery.

( By joeatta78, Saint Marina)

Reading B: For the second half of the Women Saints reading, my two favorite stories were the stories of Saint Theodora and Saint Daria. While Theodora's story is much like Marine's and Pelagien's stories, there are some different aspects of Theodora's that I find very interesting. As for Daria, her story is a bit different from all of the others and I think her story is great. 

Once again, Theodora's story is very similar to the other stories of women running away to become monks. What I like most about her story is that she runs away for a reason. Theodora feels so much guilt and sorrow when she cheats on her husband that she feels she isn't worthy of being his wife any longer and that she must pay a steep price of penance for her sin. This drive is very different from the other saints who go to remain pure or please their family. Theodora legitimately believes that this is her punishment, and while she knows she isn't pure, she hopes to help others to atone for her wrong doing. I also like the ending much better. While she does die, like all the others, the son she raises mourns her and continues with the monastery to finish what Theodora started. I also think it's really sweet that after all these years, when her husband learns of her death, he goes to where she died. Although it's quite sad that he stays there until he dies as well. 

(Russian icon)

I also liked Daria's story, although some of it I had a hard time with. The main thing that troubled me about this story is that before Daria converted to Christianity, she was a Vestal Virgin in the story. I did a big research paper on the Vestals last semester and I don't see how, in this time period, they every would have sent a Vestal to a man alone, to convert him. The Vestals were too important to managing the hearth, which they thought kept the city from falling to ruins. Also, purity was paramount to the Vestals. If a girl was suspected of not keeping her chastity vows, she would sometimes be buried alive. Therefore, I don't think they would have sent a Vestal in with a man alone. But besides that, I liked the story. I like that the lion protects Daria, but when she instructs it not to seriously harm anyone it listens to her. I also like that while she and Crisaunt converted many people, most seemed to convert after talking to Daria.

(14th-century medieval manuscript)