There are moments in every life when the ground shifts beneath us and the place we once stood with confidence becomes contested or misunderstood. Sometimes we are told we no longer belong by people who never bothered to know us. Other times we are told we do not belong among people or in places we never chose in the first place. The middle space, the place of nuance and tension, can become a lonely address.

Elizabeth I understood this reality with a clarity few of us will ever face.

When Rome excommunicated her on February 24, 1570, it was not only a political maneuver, although Pope Pius V certainly intended it to be that. It was also a public declaration that Elizabeth no longer belonged to a community that had shaped her faith. Yet she refused to let others define her soul. She once said, “There is only one Christ, Jesus, one faith. All else is a dispute over trifles.” Her words reveal a woman who knew her grounding even when the world tried to push her to the edges.

Her excommunication forced her to decide who would be.

It pushed her to define her faith rather than be defined by the institution that rejected her. It compelled her to build a church that could hold tension instead of collapsing into extremes. It led her to trust that God was larger that the categories others tried to force upon her. And it taught her to guard the sacred interior of her life with a fierce gentleness. “I have no desire to make windows into men’s souls,” she said. She would not police the conscience of others, and she would not allow others to police hers.

What she created in the wake of that rejection still shapes us.

Cut off from Rome once again, Elizabeth nurtured a tradition that found unity not in uniform belief but in common prayer. The Book of Common Prayer became the center that held when everything else was fracturing. Her refusal to choose an extreme birthed the via media, a way of being Christian that trusts truth can live in tension. Her leadership set the stage for a global communion built on relationship rather than hierarchy, and her resilience carved out space for women’s spiritual agency long before the church could imagine ordaining them.

All of this began with being pushed out.

All of it began with exile.

Her words about refusing to “make windows into men’s souls” reveal the same grounded resilience. She would not police the inner life of others, and she would not allow others to police hers. There is a kind of freedom in that posture, a freedom many women in 2026 still long for—the freedom to guard the sacred interior, to belong to yourself even when institutions or communities say otherwise.

Maybe you know something of that experience. Perhaps you have been told you do not belong because you would not choose a side or collapse into an extreme. Perhaps you have been misunderstood because your convictions do not fit neatly into someone else’s categories. Maybe you have lost community because you chose honesty over certainty. If so, you are not alone.

Elizabeth’s story reminds us that exile can become a birthplace, that being underestimated is not a verdict, that belonging can be reclaimed from within. Her life shows that the middle way is not indecision but courage, a way of standing firm when others insist you choose a side. It is a place where truth can breathe and where grace has room to move, a place where new things can take shape when the old world shuts its doors.

The middle space invites you to name what is real, to acknowledge what has been lost, and to honor the grief that comes with displacement. It invites you to trust that clarity can emerge even when certainty does not. It invites you to remember that you are not alone in this tension. And it invites you to reclaim what is yours with tenderness and resolve. The middle way is not weakness and exile is not a sign that God has stepped away. In this space, you find the courage to stay rooted, the freedom to belong to yourself, and the quiet assurance that God still breathes and so should you.

A Blessing for the Middle Way

May you stand where God has placed you, even when others misunderstood.

May you hold the tension with courage and tenderness.

May you discover that exile can become a doorway.

May you know, deep in your bones, that the One who met Jesus in the wilderness meets you in the middle too.