Following on from yesterday's post about Uni Chapel prayers, and because I have seen posts and tweets staing her name from others who knew her...
This week Miss Irene Allan died peacefully after short illness, just shy of her 101st birthday. Hers was a long and full life, lived in the service of the Lord. Her heart for the least and the lost never once wavered, and it's fair to say that many of her 'My Men' owe their lives to her dedicated and determined endeavours. Her zest for life and unique ability to hold in tension utter theological contradictions were, to the very end, inspirational. It is fair to say that she was a legend in her own lifetime.
When I was about to start my cancer treamtent, Irene said to me 'you will go through this like a ship in full sail,' and somewhere I still have the scrap of paper with the verse of scripture she handed me. I certainly was the annoying wotsit who worked all through treatment, and to this day I am complimented on my 'lovely veins,' 'beautiful scars,' and 'skin you would never know had been irradiated', so I guess she was right!
Irene was never fully reconciled to the ordination of women, but she made an exception for me. I loved her and I will miss her.