Synopsis: | It is the year 1178, and real-life mystic, composer, poet, and healer Hildegard von Bingen, founder and abbess of the great abbey of St. Rupert in what is now Germany and was then the heart of the Holy Roman Empire, can look back on a long life crowned with accomplishment. But the serenity of the abbey is soon destroyed when a heretic knight invades its precints, demanding sanctuary. Against the advice of others in the abbey, Hildegard elects to follow her concience and grant that sanctuary, a decision that will not only bring her into direct conflict with the Catholic church, but with the Holy Roman Emperor as well. Inspired by actual events, and in the tradition of "Becket" and "A Man for All Seasons," this is the story of how one woman took a stand against the power of a patriarchal society, and the price she had to pay. |