Finally we have here in Robert Ellsberg’s Blessed Among All Women a collection of women saints whose lives and spiritual gifts are recounted with respect and with depth. As a history of the strengths routinely modeled by women, it is essential not only for the spiritual life of women but most of all, perhaps, for the development of the spiritual sensitivity of men. The introduction alone, in fact, is worth the price of the book because it expands the notion of the so-called ‘female’ virtues to include the broadest scope of human qualities. This book makes a serious contribution to the newly emerging consciousness of the full equality of women, spiritual as well as professional. It is necessary spiritual reading for us all.—Joan Chittister, O.S.B., author of Called to Question and The Rule of Benedict