February 28, 2025

Dr. Cindy Aalders: Women Writing Religious Communities in Eighteenth Century England

57 minutes

In today’s conversation, the last in our Women in Theology series, we catch up with Regent’s own Library Director and Professor of the History of Christianity, Dr. Cindy Aalders. Cindy has recently published her thesis as a monograph, The Spiritual Lives and Manuscript Cultures of Eighteenth-Century Women (2024). In this conversation, we delve into the archives and lives of Methodist, Baptist and Anglican women in the eighteenth century, seeking to understand their friendship, kinship and spiritual development as demonstrated in their letter-writing and diary entries. Cindy’s work highlights the significant impact of women in relational spheres and religious communities. These women invested deeply in intergenerational friendships and spiritual kinship as they sought to be faithful to God. Cindy reminds us that we can learn much from them today as we strive to support one another in an increasingly isolated world. Cindy also shares her upcoming summer class, Children and Spiritual Identity (June 30–July 4).

Bio

Dr. Cindy Aalders is the Director of the John Richard Allison Library and Associate Professor of the History of Christianity at Regent College. She earned a Bachelor of Science from The King's University, a Master of Christian Studies and a Master of Theology in Spiritual Theology from Regent College. She completed her Doctor of Philosophy in History at the University of Oxford in 2014, focusing her research on eighteenth-century British women's spiritual lives and manuscript cultures. Cindy’s doctoral thesis, The Spiritual Lives and Manuscript Cultures of Eighteenth-Century English Women, was recently released by Oxford University Press. She has just returned to Regent from research leave, where she focused on girlhood and religious life in the long eighteenth century, digging through various archives in the process!

Cindy's Publications

The Spiritual Lives and Manuscript Cultures of Eighteenth-Century Women (2024)

To Express the Ineffable: The Hymns and Spirituality of Anne Steele (2009)

Previous Podcast Appearances

Child Centred Theology and the Spiritual Formation of Children in the 18th Century

Called to Be Friends (with Dr. David Robinson)

Friendship Recentred (with Dr. Maxine Hancock)

Puritan Treasures (with Jenny-lyn de Klerk)

Regent College Podcast

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