The discovery of the fascinating and richly documented story of Sister Benedetta Carlini, Abbess of the Convent of the Mother of God, by Judith C. Brown was an event of major historical importance. Not only is the story revealed in Immodest Acts that of the rise and fall of a powerful woman in a church community and a record of the life of a religious visionary, it is also the earliest documentation of lesbianism in modern Western history.
Born of well-to-do parents, Benedetta Carlini entered the convent at the age of nine. At twenty-three, she began to have visions of both a religious and erotic nature. Benedetta was elected abbess due largely to these visions, but later aroused suspicions by claiming to have had supernatural contacts with Christ. During the course of an investigation, church authorities not only found that she had faked her visions and stigmata, but uncovered evidence of a lesbian affair with another nun, Bartolomeo. The story of the relationship between the two nuns and of Benedetta's fall from an abbess to an outcast is revealed in surprisingly candid archival documents and retold here with a fine sense of drama.

The discovery of the fascinating and richly documented story of Sister Benedetta Carlini, Abbess of the Convent of the Mother of God, by Judith C. Brown was an event of major historical importance. Not only is the story revealed in Immodest Acts that of the rise and fall of a powerful woman in a church community and a record of the life of a religious visionary, it is also the earliest documentation of lesbianism in modern Western history.
Born of well-to-do parents, Benedetta Carlini entered the convent at the age of nine. At twenty-three, she began to have visions of both a religious and erotic nature. Benedetta was elected abbess due largely to these visions, but later aroused suspicions by claiming to have had supernatural contacts with Christ. During the course of an investigation, church authorities not only found that she had faked her visions and stigmata, but uncovered evidence of a lesbian affair with another nun, Bartolomeo. The story of the relationship between the two nuns and of Benedetta's fall from an abbess to an outcast is revealed in surprisingly candid archival documents and retold here with a fine sense of drama.

从欧洲人对女性同性恋关系存在的可能性的认识来看，他们在法律、神学和文学中对这一问题的忽略，都显示出一种极为不想承认的欲望。
总之，无论是普遍还是罕见，妇女之间的性关系只能由一个目的，增进真正的性关系，亦即与男人的性关系。这是为什么那些时代的人认为最好是避而不谈女性同性恋的原因之一。
另一个原因在于认为女性在模仿男人。
……罪行没有名称，在历史记载中也几乎没留下痕迹。西欧人关于妇女性关系相互矛盾的见解又使得人们根本不可能公开谈论。沉默孕育出混乱，混乱则产生恐惧。在这个基础之上，西方社会筑起了一道难以逾越的屏障。这道屏障持续了两千年。
————-作者接着引入本文论题——这就是为什么教会对圣母修道院院长贝内代塔·卡莉妮生平的审查有那么重要的原因。这是极为罕见的实例之一，通过这个实例，我们可以相当详细地从具体事件中窥见西方对女性同性恋的观念。在这一过程中，我们也能够重新建构并考察这些观念产生发展的社会环境。
——知识考古学家的任务，即在于，讲述一个故事。因为，“生前是一个引人注目而众说纷纭的人物，而在死后，她的事迹又使我们不能不加以注意，这种对她的注目当初官方是极力想要消除的。”