Revd Dr Marie Isaacs is probably not a name you will have heard of - I hadn't until today.  Yet, in that mysterious way that things work, I discover that, to an extent, her story and mine intertwine more than once along their way, since her ordination back in 1962 (the year I was born).  You can read about her here

So what are the links?

Revd Dr Isaacs worked alongside Revd Dr Edwin Robertson when he moved to Heath Street BC from Westbourne Park BC, which I had attended as a student in London.  This was my first experience of Baptist life, and a significant one I guess, with hindsight.  Edwin Robertson was also known to some member of the Gathering Place, so that makes for more links still!

A second link is via Revd Dr Ruth Gouldbourne, who was unofficially mentored by Marie Isaacs when she (Ruth) was a student minister at Bloomsbury.  Ruth preached at my induction on Scotland and supervised my post grad. research.  And Ruth preached at the Gathering Place many years ago when Scottish Baptist pulpits were, by and large, closed to women.

If it is sometimes isolating and isolated being the only woman Baptist minister in sole pastoral charge in Scotland, if sometimes the burden of being a pioneer weighs all too heavily on my mind and heart, I am both encouraged and chastened by the stories of these true pioneers in whose footsteps I follow or on whose shoulders I climb.  I have deep respect for this woman I have never met, and thank God for her.