tackled gradients so steep that she felt she was falling off; and how on the
way to Susa the hired car ‘sat down like an old hen’ and refused to move.
After that first visit she returned year after year, and then began to extend her
interest to Waldensian work in Sicily which she visited three times. She saw
at first hand the little hard-pressed Waldensian communities such as Riesi
where Salvatore Carcó was the pastor.
At St Leonards, at a very early stage, she had begun scattering Waldensian farthing boxes (now penny boxes) among her friends. Her powers of
persuasion must have been considerable for soon the PCC were increasing
their contributions to the WCM. Every year for many years Madelene would
arrive at our annual meetings in a large coach filled with her sea-side friends.
Madelene refers in her quiet way to ‘my Waldensian coffee mornings’ as
if they were just a matter of making coffee and smiling sweetly. Far from it.
She set herself a goal, and reached it by methodical and cost-effective means.
As soon as one year’s coffee morning was over, she began preparing for the
following year’s by going round other churches’ sales of work, buying up
jumble, knickknacks, white elephants – anything that could be stored and
re-sold. In the weeks before the sale, tins and packets from food shopping
would be laid aside. As soon as Seville oranges came on the market in January she would set to work making great quantities of marmalade. As the year
progressed the stock of goods in her flat grew larger and larger. When space
in cupboards became tight, the goods would be laid on a spare bed; when
the bed was needed for a guest, they would then be moved to the floor, to
a window-sill, to a dressing-table. ‘It’s no good thinking your home is your
castle,’ she says.
As the day of her sale approached, her friends would be urged to a spasm
of cake-making, or persuaded to extract items from their cupboards and attics
to stock the stalls. The sale opened at 10 a.m. in the vestibule of the church.
With her team of motivated helpers, nearly all goods were gone from the stalls
by 12. These sales have recently been earning £500 to £600; and in addition
donations were handed to her and there was a contribution from the PCC. It
is all methodically recorded year by year in an account book.
When Madelene went to Italy she caught a vision. She has been guided
to interpret the vision in an intensely practical way. More than that, she succeeded in passing on something of her own inspiration to her friends. As well
as doing major share of the work, she has been a motivator, an energiser and
an inspirer of others. After more than forty years and nearly an octogenarian,
she is entitled to retire.
God bless you richly, Madelene; and thank you for your many years of
endeavour for your friends in Italy. You will be a hard example to follow!
Prescot Stephens
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