Anne’s legacy

by Letters Editor · June 14, 2012

From Cecil Cullen, Alberton, Gauteng

A� Jerusalem Bible, Popular Edition, circa the 1980s, with a light blue dust cover�the years have made it kind of tatty, the pages slightly misaligned where some of them have broken away from the spine, slightly grubby from contact with working hands, many worn thin at the corners, with their complement of dog-ears.

Little coloured stickers have been stuck onto some pages, marking passages significant to the owner. Holy cards, spiritual tracts, bits of paper reside between the pages, adding to their weary bulk and possibly contributing to the spinal damage. A well-used book�not one to grace the shelves of appearance-conscious people. This was Anne�s bible.

"When I look at it in its shabbiness and brokenness the others seem sterile..."

The world is full of bibles of every version and edition, each Christian home probably has at least a couple. And I venture to guess that many, many of them are in excellent condition�to the extent that they might even be placed back on the book-seller�s shelf as new, with not much sign of use.

Not so Anne�s bible. When I look at it in its shabbiness and brokenness the others seem sterile, just so much paper printed and bound and churned out by the publishers. They have no charisma, no houding, as our young men once used to say. They have not been used; their message has not been relayed.

It takes years of devotion and loving use to mould the publisher�s product into a bible like Anne�s. Its condition speaks to us of its owner; it�s a tribute to the type of person she was. You can�t go downtown and buy one like it. And to reproduce one like it you have to walk in the steps of a person like Anne, to hear the Word of God as she heard it.

In some ways it reminds me of the paintings one sees of an aged person�s hands clasped in prayer�it speaks of Christian devotion, of the love for God.

Anne, who passed away last year, was a great lady. Not in the sense of, say, Hilary Clinton or Margaret Thatcher�she was a quiet restrained person who seldom pronounced in public. But she was a committed Christian and held the highest principles of Christianity, which, in spite of her restraint, she was prepared to defend to anyone, anywhere, anytime. She was a good mother, an excellent grandmother, and a devoted and supportive spouse.

Her bible deserves to be kept under glass in memory of the type of person she was. It might also remind us of what we might be.