By Dr. Linda Martin

In her eighth counsel Angela says:

Love those for whom you are responsible with a particular awareness of their person.  Do not single out one more than another for they are all God’s children and you have no idea what God wishes to make of them.  How can you know that those who to you seem worthless and unattractive will not be the very ones to show the greatest generosity and to be the most pleasing to the Divine Majesty?

I hear Angela affirm we are all created in the image of God, and the dignity of each individual demands we recognize the inherent dignity of all—young and old, men and women, ordained and lay.

One of the classes I teach at UC is a graduate level introductory course in Church history. An important issue in the study of history is that of story, and more specifically, whose voices and stories are written into the historical record (and whose voices and stories are not written into the historical record). Women’s voices are seldom heard, so I begin each class with one of Angela’s counsels.  I ask students to reflect on what they hear St. Angela saying to them in light of their experiences in ministry and in light of what we’ve read for the week.  The exercise is well-received and the insights are often profound. 

In this same Church history course, in addition to a fairly traditional survey of Christian history, I use a textbook titled Her Story.  Her Story seeks to uncover women’s voices throughout Christian history, and reveals the ways women have been agents throughout Christian history, helping shape the very tradition that so often has ignored and/or silenced them. 

I begin each class with Angela’s counsels because I feel strongly no student should leave UC without an awareness of and appreciation for the Ursuline heritage.  I seek to recover women’s voices in this class because UC is a women’s institution that seeks intentionally to help women and men find their own voices.   For as Angela tells us, we are all God’s children, and we have no idea what God intends to make of us, but God does intend something.  Each and every one of us has something to offer the church and the world.