Abstract
This study compares the religious education and spiritual pursuits of Angela Merici in Renaissance Catholic Europe and Shigong, a seventeenth-century Chinese Buddhist nun. It examines how cultural values and religious institutions shaped women’s spiritual development and social roles. Through prayer, moral discipline, and education, Merici enabled women to pursue holiness beyond convent walls and engage with society. In contrast, Buddhist women’s spiritual cultivation in late Ming and early Qing China emphasized precepts, classical learning, and self-reflection. By exploring these differences, this study highlights how cultural and religious contexts shaped women’s spiritual agency and the relationship between inward cultivation and outward social engagement.
Keywords: Religious Education; Women’s Spirituality; Angela Merici; Shigong; Renaissance Catholicism; Late Ming and Early Qing China; Inward and Outward Spirituality
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