Women, Men, and Spiritual Power: Female Saints and Their Male Collaborators (Gender, Theory, and Religion)

John W. Coakley explores the complex relationships between female mystics and the clerics who wrote about them. These relationships were marked by a fundamental tension between control and fascination: the priests and friars were supposed to hold authority over the women entrusted to their care, but they often switched roles, as the clerics became intrigued with the spiritual gifts of these mystics. Coakley argues that male religious authorities viewed themselves in gendered partnerships that brought together female mystical power and male ecclesiastical authority without placing one above the other. Coakley focuses on the narratives of the lives of Catherine of Siena, Hildegard of Bingen, Angela of Foligno, and six other mystics. His study undermines simplistic characterizations of male control over religious women to offer an important contribution to medieval religious history.