feminine-genius

"Quintessential matron"

According to Wikileaks, that is how American diplomats assessed the "Iron Lady" back in the mid-1970's (as well as "frightfully British"), but she proved to be so much more. The family announced that she has just gone on to her eternal reward:

• Margaret Thatcher dies: coverage in full

Margaret Thatcher's journey from Grantham grocer’s daughter to 10 Downing Street was not quite without parallel — her predecessor, Ted Heath, started from if anything more humble origins — but her achievement over 11 years once she reached the highest office left most of her fellow prime ministers way behind.

After winning a scholarship to Oxford, where she read chemistry, Margaret Roberts became fascinated by politics. Her father, who had been a councillor in Grantham, had certainly inspired her, and she determined to try to secure a candidacy to be a Conservative MP.

Her two attempts in the safe Labour seat of Dartford in the 1950 and 1951 elections were unsuccessful, though she made a name for herself as a doughty fighter with a bright future. The other bonus of her time in Dartford was that she met and married her future husband, Denis Thatcher, who had taken over and was greatly reviving a family chemicals business. They married in 1951, when she was 26 and he 36, and two years later she gave birth to twins, Carol and Mark.

Motherhood meant that she did not fight the 1955 election, but instead concentrated on a new career at the Bar. In 1959 she was adopted for the Conservative seat of Finchley, and was returned to parliament for the first time at the election of that year. She held the seat until her retirement from the Commons in 1992.

Prayers and for her soul and for her family. May she rest in peace.

Well done, good and faithful steward!

Dr Evelyn Billings, wife and partner of Dr John Billings, who founded the World Organization Ovulation Method Billings (WOOMB) in order to help women to understand and manage their fertility naturally, has died at the age of 95. Her book, The Billings Method, was first published in 1980, and has been translated into 22 languages. From LifeSiteNews:

For half a century the Billings traveled the world teaching and promoting their method in faithfulness to Pope Paul VI’s call to “men (and women) of science (and) physicians (to) be obedient to the Lord’s call and to act as faithful interpreters of His plan.”

In 2003, Pope John Paul II made Dr. Lyn a Dame Commander of St. Gregory the Great in recognition of the fiftieth anniversary of the Billings Ovulation Method. She was an active member of the Pontifical Academy for Life.

She was recognized with Honorary Doctorates from universities around the world including an Honoris Causa Degree from Tor Vergata University in Rome in 2005.

In 2002, Drs. John and Evelyn Billings were jointly declared International Catholic Physicians of the Year by the International Catholic Federation of Medical Associations.

Joan Clements, Director of WOOMB International Ltd., noted that "couples in more than 100 countries bear testament to the wonderful work of this selfless woman and her husband."

Along with her husband, Dr. Lyn has been instrumental in bringing the Billings Ovulation Method to China, where it is now incorporated into the Chinese Government Family Planning Program as a method of choice by fertile couples. "In China alone," Clements observed, "where they trained thousands to teach their Method, a substantial drop in the abortion rate has been attributed to their work."

She was preceded in death by her husband, who passed into eternal life in 2007. May they both rest in peace.

A Curious Gift of Self

The widow of TS Eliot died last week at the age of 86, and her story reveals a singular arc of dedication, begun in early adolescence.

Valerie was sent to school at Queen Anne’s, Caversham, near Reading, where the ethos was sporting rather than intellectual. At the age of 14, however, she was visited by a sudden illumination when she heard a recording of John Gielgud reading Eliot’s Journey of the Magi. Thereafter her obsession with the poet became a family joke.

The headmistress of Queen Anne’s may also have smiled wryly when Valerie Fletcher told her, on leaving, that she was determined to become TS Eliot’s secretary. For six months she worked at the Brotherton Library of the University of Leeds, and then as private secretary to the novelist Charles Morgan. But her aim, as she artlessly phrased it, was always “to get to Tom”; and in August 1950 she duly succeeded in becoming his secretary at Faber & Faber.

Not only did she doggedly become a fine secretary and guardian of his life's work, but she managed to hide her tremendous affection for him, so that when he finally hovered near an engagement, he had to ask if she even liked him.

Her life's goal wasn't some dark machination to coopt the poet, but a gift borne of devotion to him as a person. I admit I've never heard of such a tale, but then there are few men of the calibre of Eliot who pass our way. There was nothing in it for her other than the great satisfaction of serving a man she adored, easing his later years, and offering him joy.

When the new-marrieds returned from their honeymoon in Menton [1957], the change in Eliot was startling. “You look as if, like Dante, you’d passed into Paradise,” someone told him. “Exactly,” he replied. “I’m the luckiest man in the world,” he would say, “I do not deserve such happiness.” If Valerie had to endure the disdain of some of Eliot’s circle, she rejoiced that through unstinting devotion all her intuitions were justified.

“He obviously needed to have a happy marriage,” she observed after her husband’s death in 1965. “There was a little boy in him that had never been released.” At parties the Eliots would hold hands and gaze at each other like lovesick teenagers, in defiance of the 38 years that lay between them.

The wounds in Eliot ran deep, stemming from a short and stormy earlier marriage to a woman who later had to be committed to a mental hospital. It's not clear how much Valerie knew of those details, other than that his first wife had died in 1947. For years he had been wracked with guilt, and '[h]is conversion to a gloomy Anglicanism in 1927 had only reinforced the mould."

But with Valerie came a wholesome affection and selfless love. It was in giving that she received a great deal, and they both benefited by the trajectory of her life. There is no indication of what sort of faith life she had, but may God smile favourably on her fidelity and oblation. RIP, dear sister.

[BTW, it would appear that she worked closely with this lovely woman.]

We've lost the “doyenne of decorum”

Letitia Baldridge has died at the age of 86. As Jacqueline Kennedy's social secretary, she was most visible in this country during the Kennedy presidency, but she's written much since then.

Above all she sought to preach the virtues of a little decorum as a brash new-money age of celebrity washed away the values of old. “Many people feel we’ve lost all sense of taste,” she noted in an interview with Women’s Wear Daily in 2007, making no secret of the fact that she was one of them. “Notoriety is what counts, and what sells. As far as excellence, half the people don’t even recognise it when they see it. These celebrity fashion icons, if they have screamingly bad taste, no one seems to care. When [Barbra Streisand] wears nightgowns for her fourth wedding and puts her bosoms in people’s faces, everyone thinks that’s the way to behave.” Jacqueline Kennedy, by contrast, “did not know a moment of bad taste.”

The obituary has some funny anecdotes, because despite being a little pretentious in her early years (which she readily admits) she did find a gracious ability to laugh at herself over her many faux-pas.

The catalogue of calamity began in June 1947, she admitted, when she was invited through her father to attend a garden party at Buckingham Palace. It was crowded and, turning from one conversation she stretched out a leg over which a large figure tripped and was sent flying. It was Winston Churchill. “I wanted to die,” she said.

Priceless! I did mention etiquette in the ACW book, since it is usually a constructive body of rules that are based on basic charity. Most etiquette is filled with lovely courtesies, but when there is no faith to keep it focused, it does have a tendency to devolve into meaningless trifles that become increasingly exclusive.

RIP, dear sister, and thank you for returning to your duties when President Kennedy was assassinated. Your strength and guidance helped the country through the crisis.

Courageous Sister Murdered

On November 15th, Sister Valsa John of the Sisters of Charity of Jesus and Mary was shot to death in an Indian coal mining town in the state of Jharkhand. The 53-year-old nun was buried from the cathedral in Dumka, where she was remembered for her fidelity to her mission, despite intense pressure from moneyed interests in the region:

Among the crowd that filled the cathedral, the brother, sister and two nephews of the nun, who for 20 years dedicated her life to the Santal tribal region. Bishop Julius Marandi of Dumka, told AsiaNews: "Her violent death was a terrible shock and a great loss to the Church. We seek justice, but while we mourn this loss, our mission for the poor, the weak and voiceless will continue, strengthened and renewed by the blood of Sister Valsa, who now intercedes for human rights, justice, dignity and hope of these people. "

Fr. Tom Kavala, SJ, who has worked for over 15 years with the nun, told AsiaNews: "Sister Valsa created a tribal organization to stop the expropriation of land sought by the powerful coal lobbies, including helping them to obtain compensation from companies. Six years ago, one of these lobbies e tried to buy out nine villages and Sister Valsa mobilized the local poor people. These coal barons lodged 33 complaints against her and her supporters, and many of them ended up in prison".

"Sister Valsa - said Mgr. Marandi - paid for her struggle for the poor and defenseless, against the interests of the powerful coal mafia with her life. The Church of Dumka and all Jharkhand pray that her martyrdom will renew the mission of the Church to be a witness of faith. "

Bless her for her courage and dedication to the people she loved. May she rest in peace and intercede for all who call upon her.

A "powerhouse of creativity"

That is how Dr Margaret Ogola saw the feminine vocation, and she provided a marvelous example of its potential. This mother of six was driven by her love for the family -- especially children -- and was ultimately responsible for administering roughly 20% of the health care facilities in her native Kenya, speaking out tirelessly on behalf of human dignity.

She attacked the sacred cows of international development organisations by insisting on “the availability of cheap and safe methods of child spacing such as Natural Family Planning”, expressing her distress “that there seems to be a conspiracy to keep women in the dark, especially the African woman, regarding the many dangerous side-effects of contraceptives”, and calling for recognition of “the irreplaceable role of parents and the family in educating and in forming children in matters of sexuality”. (She herself wrote a book to help parents with this.)

While recognising that the collapse of sexual morality was basically to blame for the AIDS epidemic, she was full of compassion for those suffering in one way or another from the disease and insistent that poverty was driving its spread among women.

One can see how such a philosophy placed her at odds with the United Nations, which constantly ties its development dollars to the implementaion of immoral "family planning" structures. She knew better, realising how the family was always undermined by such initiatives.

Beyond the reproductive issues, she promoted women, whom she recognised as the backbone of the family, and who must be supported in her vocation in order for the poor to overcome their marginalisation:

The main reason for this is poverty and the disadvantaged place of women. Therefore prevention programs should have women at the core, not only to help them say "no", but also to have alternatives when they say "no". This means attention to the poverty prevailing in our country which is extremely severe, with about 57 per cent of Kenyans living on less than one dollar a day. Most of the poor are women, and particularly young women, because socially they are not considered equal to men and so have less access to education and resources at every level. Their situation has to be addressed in a holistic and integral manner, so that you not only foster family values but also give them opportunities to make a living other than by transactional sex, which young girls get into out of sheer poverty.

Her death is a real loss for Kenya on one level, though an advocate in heaven may allow the truth to prevail. She was always a woman of hope, as this account from her funeral attests:

She was progressively closer and closer to God. Today at the funeral Mass the priest who looked after her mentioned that she wanted to do everything, big or small, no matter how difficult it was, for love. Different people who spoke at her funeral – family, friends, colleagues and government officials -- highlighted the fact that she was a very talented and determined person, an untiring worker and always seeking ways to serve better in the medical profession, especially in the care of HIV/AIDS orphans who were her special concern as a paediatrician. She had a great love for children and fought for respect for the dignity of human life. They also highlighted the faith and trust in God which characterized her life.

With God, all things are possible. Rest in peace, dear sister, and remember these little ones before the celestial throne.

[This video is not in English, but the point is clear -- much work remains to be done.]

 

"Women were pretty mean to me"

That's the experience of Annette Charles after taking the role of "Cha Cha" in Grease, which you may remember (here's a little help). Even as a teenager, I despised the movie when I first saw it in the theatres, and I have only come to dislike it more as the years pass. (It doesn't help that every year Catholic schools across the country love to perform it with younger and younger casts.)

The movie was a riot of adults behaving badly, of teenagers lacking guidance, and of vice conquering virtue. Remember, just as bad boy Danny (John Travolta) realises that he should straighten up if he wants to win the pure Sandy (Olivia Newton-John) she likewise has a change of heart (and a change of costume) and embraces her inner sleeze.

This was just one in a long string of films that proved that the straight-laced 1950's was a hot-bed of hormones just waiting to spill over (Animal House was another in this genre) and that those who weren't complete hypocrites were just morons. The frustration may have been related to the often vapid, vaguely-Christian promotion of conformity and "good behaviour" as thin gruel--more important for social order than actual imitation of Christ. There was also a near-puritanical horror of sexual urges, and if we've learned nothing else in the last ten years, it's that Jansenism is no way to form children in authentic chastity.

I may be simplifying it too much, but something caused the culture to topple, and the Protestant ethos of the public square had no ability to push back. In fact, it buckled and caved. That said, we pray for the soul of Annette Charles. This starring role put her on the map, but her destination was somewhat confused after that--as was the nation that latched onto such entertainment at an enormous cost.

 

 

She survived Hollywood

 

Sybil Jason was supposed to rival the biggest child star of her generation, but rather than an ongoing cat fight, the two little girls established a friendship that lasted until the end.

In 1935, when she was six, she was spotted in the British film Barnacle Bill by Irving Asher, then in charge of Warner Bros at Elstree. Asher telephoned Jack Warner to say: "I've seen this kid, she'll be bigger than Shirley Temple." She had a screen test and Jack Warner signed her.

Sybil Jacobson was born in Cape Town, South Africa, on November 23 1927. When she was two the family moved to England, where she was soon picking out tunes on the piano; at three she was impersonating Maurice Chevalier, Greta Garbo and Jeanette MacDonald on stage; at four, she was headlining at London night clubs, singing, dancing, doing impressions and playing the piano.

Her uncle, the bandleader Harry Jacobson, was also piano accompanist to Gracie Fields, and it was Gracie who was responsible for getting Sybil her first film part in London.

Once in Hollywood, Sybil was top-billed in Little Big Shot (1935), for which she sang the title song, Rolling in Money. The film bore a striking similarity to Little Miss Marker (1934), starring Shirley Temple, and was a success with critics and audiences alike.

To see some crying scenes, go here. You also might remember as Becky, the scullery maid who befriended Shirley Temple in The Little Princess. I wish we knew more about what grounded her so that she didn't become shredded by the fame machine, though WW2, which grounded her in South Africa, may have played its part. May she rest in peace.