I know of one who expressed her devotion to Christ by stripping naked
before the cross: Angela of Foligno (1248-1309). I remember Paul
Lachance at a Kalamazoo conference speaking about this, and the text
at hand to me with this detail is the excerpt from her _Liber de Vere
Fidelium Experientia", in Elizabeth Petroff, ed. _Medieval Women's Visionary
Literature_ (OUP 1986), pp. 254-263. In c. 11 her amanuensis, her uncle Fra
Arnaldo OFM, writes: "in this understanding of the cross there was given to
me such a great fire, that standing next to the cross I stripped myself
of all my clothing, and I offered myself to him completely." She then
goes on to make a vow of perpetual chastity, so clearly there is a link
between the nakedness and her offering of herself to Christ alone.
The friar obviously did not see this as in any way problematic, or he would
not have included it.
There is a study of this topic by Margaret Miles, _Carnal Knowing: Female
Nakedness and Religious Meaning in the Christian West_ (Boston: Beacon,
1989).
Monica Sandor
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