O Holy Spirit, Root of Life

Adapter: Jean Janzen

Jean Janzen was born on December 5, 1933, the seventh of Henry Peter Wiebe and Anna Schultz Wiebe's eventual eight children (Three Mennonite Poets 5). For the first five years of her life, Janzen lived in Dalmeny, Saskatchewan (A Cappella 25). In 1938, she moved to Mountain Lake, Minnesota when her schoolteacher father began his second ministry as a pastor (“Coming into Voice”). A year later, the family moved to Kansas (“Coming into Voice”). Janzen says she cannot remember when she wrote her first poem, but the first evidence of her work is a handwritten book of five poems that she made in third or fourth grade, which was saved by her mother through the family’s many moves (E-mail Interview). She had very little exposure to po… Go to person page >

Author: St. Hildegard

Hildegard, St., Virgin and Abbess, was born at Bockelheim, or Bockenheim, Frankfurt, 1098. Her father, Hildebert, was one of the Knights of Meginhard, Count of Spanheim. When eight years old she was committed to tho care of a sister of the Count, Jutta, the Abbess of St. Disibod, a position in which she was succeeded by Hildegard in 1136. Under the rule of Hildegard the convent became so crowded that a new one was built at Rupertsberg, near Bingen, into which, in 1147, Hildegard removed with eighteen Sisters. Hildegard gained great notoriety in very early life on account of visions to which, it is said, she was subject from her 6th to her 15th year. In later life she filled a considerable place in the history of her times, not only as a wri… Go to person page >