Aelred of Rievaulx

Aelred of Rievaulx was born around 1110 in Hexham, in the border country between England and Scotland, into a family of hereditary priests serving the shrine of Saint Andrew. His father Eilaf had married despite his clerical role, a common practice in northern England before the Gregorian reforms took full hold. This gave Aelred an intimate familiarity with both the old Saxon church traditions and the new Continental monasticism that was reshaping religious life across Europe. He was educated at the cathedral school in Durham, where he encountered the classical authors alongside Christian texts, developing the literary sensibility that would later distinguish his spiritual writings.

At fourteen, Aelred was sent to the court of King David I of Scotland, where he spent the next decade rising to become a trusted advisor and, by some accounts, the king's steward. Court life introduced him to the chivalric ideals that would profoundly influence his understanding of friendship and love, but it also presented him with a spiritual crisis. He later wrote cryptically of the "storm of lust" that troubled his youth, and modern scholars have debated whether this referred to heterosexual desires, same-sex attractions, or both. What is clear is that the tension between worldly advancement and spiritual calling became unbearable. In 1134, at age twenty-four, he abandoned his promising secular career to enter the Cistercian abbey of Rievaulx in Yorkshire.

The Cistercians represented the cutting edge of monastic reform, emphasizing a return to the strict observance of the Rule of Saint Benedict, manual labor, and withdrawal from worldly entanglements. At Rievaulx, Aelred found not only peace but intellectual and spiritual fellowship under the guidance of Abbot William. He was appointed novice master in 1142 and proved remarkably gifted at spiritual direction, drawing on his courtly background to understand the particular struggles of young men leaving the world. In 1143 he was chosen to establish a new foundation at Revesby in Lincolnshire, and in 1147 he was elected abbot of Rievaulx itself, a position he held until his death.

As abbot, Aelred transformed Rievaulx into one of the most influential monasteries in England. The community grew from thirty monks to over six hundred under his leadership, requiring the construction of vast new buildings whose ruins still astonish visitors today. But Aelred's leadership was marked more by tenderness than authority. Walter Daniel, his monk-biographer, describes how Aelred's quarters became an informal infirmary for the emotionally and spiritually wounded, and how his gentleness drew confidences from monks who had been broken by harsher regimes elsewhere. He was known to weep openly during sermons and to embrace his monks with an affection that some found excessive. The criticism reached Bernard of Clairvaux, who gently warned Aelred that "love without discretion" could undermine monastic discipline. Aelred's response reveals his governing conviction: that authentic Christian community must be built on friendship rather than fear.

His Writing and Its Influence

Aelred began writing in the 1140s at the request of Bernard of Clairvaux, producing historical works that established his reputation as a scholar. His "Genealogy of the Kings of the English" and "The Battle of the Standard" demonstrated his mastery of contemporary Latin prose and his ability to weave spiritual meaning into historical narrative. But his lasting contribution to Christian literature comes from his spiritual treatises, particularly "Spiritual Friendship" and "The Mirror of Charity."

"Spiritual Friendship," written in the 1160s as a dialogue between Aelred and his monks, represents the most sophisticated Christian theology of friendship produced in the medieval period. Drawing on Cicero's "De Amicitia" but thoroughly Christianizing it, Aelred argues that human friendship, properly ordered, becomes a pathway to divine love. His famous assertion that "God is friendship" shocked some contemporaries but reflected his deep conviction that the Trinity itself models the perfect community of love that human relationships can image. The work's exploration of same-sex affection was remarkably nuanced for its time, acknowledging both the spiritual potential and the temptations inherent in such bonds.

"The Mirror of Charity" emerged from Aelred's correspondence with Bernard of Clairvaux about the proper ordering of love. Where Bernard emphasized the stages by which love ascends from self-love to love of God, Aelred focused on how divine love enables authentic human community. His psychological insight into the mechanisms of projection, idealization, and disappointment in relationships reads with startling modernity, while his solutions remain thoroughly grounded in monastic wisdom.

Aelred's influence extended far beyond his immediate circle. His writings on friendship were copied throughout medieval Europe and helped shape the spiritual friendships that sustained figures like Francis and Clare of Assisi. During the English Reformation his works were largely forgotten, but the twentieth century witnessed a remarkable revival of interest. Modern readers have found in his integration of psychological insight, classical learning, and mystical theology a model for Christian humanism that speaks across denominational boundaries. His canonization by the Catholic Church came only in 1476, but his influence on Protestant spiritual formation has grown steadily, particularly among those seeking to understand how human intimacy can serve rather than compete with divine love.

Aelred died on January 12, 1167, after a long struggle with kidney stones that had left him increasingly frail. Walter Daniel's account of his final years describes a man whose physical suffering only deepened his capacity for compassion, and whose death was received by his community as the loss of a father rather than merely an abbot.

Who should read Aelred: Readers grappling with the relationship between human friendship and spiritual growth, particularly those who have been taught to see intimate relationships as obstacles to rather than pathways toward divine love. He is essential for anyone interested in the theology of community, whether in monastic, parish, or secular contexts. His work is especially valuable for readers who have experienced same-sex attraction and wonder how such feelings might be integrated into rather than simply suppressed within Christian discipleship. He is not for those seeking simple answers about sexuality or relationships, but for those willing to engage the complex interplay between human psychology and divine grace.