Mother Joanna Mary -1978

Mother Joanna Mary CR was born Janye Vazeille Boddy, third child of the Vicar of Pittington in 1893. Her mother was in some way connected with Catherine Booth, wife of the famous General of the Salvation Army, and the name Vazeille came from her). After being expelled from the China Inland Mission she served in France during the first World War and the injuries sustained during her time there as a Missionary plagued her for the rest of her life. Her father was responsible for introducing her to Smith Wigglesworth, one of the early leaders of the Pentecostal movement. He visited Jayne and laid hands upon her and from then on she had the gift of tongues. She seldom spoke of this experience except sometimes to her Novices after she became Novice Mistress in the Community, and it was not until the Charismatic Revival in Grahamstown in the early 1970's that it really became known. After training as a teacher at Durham University and caring for her mother until her death in 1928, Janye Boddy travelled to Grahamstown and was admitted to the Novitiate in 1932, making her First Profession as Sister Joanna Mary CR in 1934. She spent many of her years teaching in many schools and parishes around Southern Africa. She was soon recalled Grahamstown to become Mother Superior, a position she held for a relatively short period, mainly due to her increasing bad health, however she continued to serve as a link between the earlier Charismatic Revival in England in her youth and the one being led by Bishop Bill Burnett in Grahamstown in the early 1970's. (source: https://www.ru.ac.za/allanwebb/history/)
contributed by: Carol Beneke
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Mother Joanna Mary -1978