"Alf, you had better consider this"

This past August marked the passing of one of the most influential persons involved in the beginning of Trinity: Marjory Stanway, wife of Bishop Alfred “Alf” Stanway, Trinity’s founder and first Dean/President. Their influence upon us, who were part of the beginning of the School, was profound and out of all proportion to the time we had with them.

Most of us got to know the Stanways in late 1975, and by the fall of 1978 they were taking their departure back to Australia, due to the Bishop’s advancing Parkinson’s disease. The Bishop died in 1989 in Australia, and now Marjory has followed him.

Who was Marjory Stanway? Marjory was first a caring and thoughtful listener. She cared greatly about people. She was hospitable and loved to invite us to tea or a meal. You always came away from a time with Marjory with the sense that she had given you her attention and that you had been understood.

The second thing that stands out in my recollection of Marjory is her devotion to Christ. She was a woman of prayer. I have little doubt that she prayed over her extensive prayer list until the day she died. Her mind was shaped by a biblical view of things and enabled her to see things in terms of a deep relationship with Christ. This awareness peppered her speech in a quiet and unostentatious way.

Marjory was wholeheartedly a wife and fellow missionary. They were close as husband and wife and close as partners in ministry. After leaving Africa, Bishop Alf received a letter asking him to consider leaving his position as a teacher at Ridley College in Australia, a position he had taken after he and Marjory had spent some 34 years as missionaries.

Members of the Fellowship of Witness were asking him to come to America to help start Trinity Episcopal School for Ministry as its first Dean/President. The Bishop thought: “Marjory will never go for this. I’ll just put this letter in the pile of mail; when she sees it she will just pass it over.” To his surprise, Marjory brought him the letter and said, “Alf, you had better consider this.”

When we were consecrating the Stanway Institute for Mission and Evangelism at Trinity, Marjory flew all the way here from Australia to be part of the festivities. It was a great time of reunion and expectation.

I want to make sure I include our appreciation of Marjory as a correspondent. Marjory wrote letters even when arthritis made it painful. How we loved to hear from her — with her usual good humor, in her last letter she referred to herself as “the bionic woman” since so many of her “parts” had been replaced.

I am not at all certain that we adequately communicated to Marjory what she meant to us. We shall have to tell her that when we see each other in the heavenlies, where no doubt she will still be a wonderful influence upon us for good. Part of Alf's and her extraordinary impact upon us was their example of being the kinds of Christians that we hoped to become. May Marjory rest in peace with her beloved Alf in the presence of the Lord.

Bishop John Rodgers was Trinity’s second Dean/President.