The Girl Who Baptized Herself

How a Lost Scripture About a Saint Named Thecla Reveals the Power of Knowing Our Worth

De: Meggan Watterson

This riveting exploration of a nearly lost first-century scripture tells the story of a courageous saint named Thecla and offers us a road map to knowing our worth.

“Meggan Watterson writes with a prophet’s vision and a mystic’s heart.”—Arianna Huffington, founder and CEO, Thrive Global

A teenage girl named Thecla is sitting at her bedroom window listening to a man share stories nearby. Her mother and fiancé order her to stop. But Thecla, trapped in a world that expects her to marry and have children, refuses. This man, Paul, is talking about a world she wants to believe in: an inner world of freedom to define her own life. And he’s talking about a kind of love she hasn’t known before—a love that asks her to be true to who she is within.

For Meggan Watterson, a Harvard-trained feminist theologian, Thecla’s story in The Acts of Paul and Thecla has everything to do with power. Thecla’s refusal to be controlled, as well as the authority she reclaims by baptizing herself, reads like a lost gospel for finding our own source of power within—a power that allows us to know who we are and to make choices based on that knowing. This hidden scripture suggests that Christianity before the fourth century was about defying the patriarchy, not deifying it. But early church fathers excluded The Acts of Paul and Thecla, along with other sacred texts such as The Gospel of Mary, from the New Testament.

Watterson synthesizes scripture, memoir, and politics to illuminate a story that has been left out of the canon for far too long, one that follows a girl freeing herself from a life predicated on the expectations of others—a path that made her feel unworthy. Thecla’s story offers us a path to take back the power we often give to others and live based on the truth of who we are.

©2025 Meggan Watterson (P)2025 Random House Audio

Reseñas de la Crítica

“Watterson invites us to reclaim the parts of ourselves that we’ve been told to hide for centuries, reminding us of who we really are: holy, whole, and free.”—Elise Loehnen, New York Times bestselling author of On Our Best Behavior

“Now more than ever, we need this two-thousand-year-old story to remind us that our power is not in any external force, but within. And that it is with our own self-authority, our own self-blessing, and our own naked revolt to claim it. This isn’t a story; it’s a playbook.”—Holly Whitaker, New York Times bestselling author of Quit Like a Woman

“Thecla’s story is a compelling road map for readers to live authentically and challenge the patriarchal norms that have silenced women’s voices for centuries. Watterson’s book illuminates a path to epiphanies and empowerment.”—Shannon Watts, founder of Moms Demand Action and author of Fired Up