Florence Nightingale: The Making of a Radical Theologian

by Val Webb

"When very many years ago  I planned a future, my one idea was not organizing a hospital but organizing a religion."

Florence Nightingale

"Val Webb's carefully crafted study of Florence Nightingale's religious works, letters, and diaries reveals some surprising and little known aspects of this great nineteenth-century woman pioneer reformer. Her posthumously published writings are evidence of a strong religious vocation and of unexpectedly radical theological thought, resonating more with contemporary feminist theology and process thought than with the Victorian ideas of her own day. This book shows the complex personality, brilliant mind, and deeply religious motivation of this God-intoxicated woman, who is both a mystic and a militant, an original thinker and great innovative doer. Much of this comes as a great surprise and challenge to the reader. Webb's study is a fine example of the new kind of scholarship on Florence Nightingale. It is a most vivid account and a truly engrossing read."

Ursula King, Director, Centre for Comparative Studies in Religion and Gender, University of Bristol, England

This book is published by Chalice Press, PO Box 179, St. Louis, MO 63166-0179.

The book can be ordered through your local bookstore (ISBN 0-8272-1032-9, 363 pp.), from the publisher at 1-800-366-3383, from the Chalice Press website, from Chalice Press via e-mail, or directly from the author via e-mail.

Val Webb's career spans theology, art, business and microbiology. She has degrees in both science and religion from the University of Queensland, Australia, and a Ph.D. in systematic theology from Luther Northwestern Seminary, St. Paul, Minnesota. She is on the adjunct faculty of the University of Minnesota and is the author of several books, including In Defense of Doubt: An Invitation to Adventure and Why We're Equal: Introducing Feminist Theology, from Chalice Press.

You can e-mail her by clicking  here.