In Memory of Our Newly-Reposed Sister, Mother Elizabeth

Mother Elizabeth reposed in the Lord on 9 September, the feast of St. Pimen.

She was born on November 12th, 1946, in Scotland, one of 4 daughters of an Anglican clergyman. She trained as a nurse and midwife and worked and traveled widely, taking an interest in everything from motorcycles to Celtic history.

About 15 years ago, Mother Elizabeth decided to go back to school to study anthropology, and she first entered an Orthodox Church to research a paper on attitudes towards death in various cultures. This lead to a meeting with Metropolitan Anthony Bloom, who eventually received her into the Church. Having drifted away from the faith of her childhood, Mother Elizabeth rediscovered it in its fullness in Holy Orthodoxy and soon felt drawn to the monastic life. She spent a year living with Mother Thais, a French Orthodox nun and semi-recluse in the mountains, and soon after entered the Monastery of the Protection at Bussy-en-Othe.

About 4 years later Mother Elizabeth fell ill with cancer and returned to Great Britain for treatment. After surgery and chemotherapy she traveled to Russia, joined a semi-monastic sisterhood in Moscow and became involved in the care of the terminally ill. Mother Elizabeth would have remained in Moscow were it not for a serious head injury. She had no recollection as to how it came about; her friends found her in a Moscow hospital several days later.

Forced to return to London for treatment, Mother Elizabeth subsequently entered the Monastery of the Nativity of the Mother of God in Holland. Her Abbess, Mother Maria, saw how much she missed the traditions of the Russian Church, and brought her to the Lesna Monastery, which m. Maria knew well from her youth, when she would visit St. John of Shanghai there. Mother Elizabeth entered Lesna in January of 1997 and was tonsured a rassaphore nun on the feast of St. Theodosius of the Kiev Caves, 16 May 2000. She worked hard as the senior nurse at the monastery, caring for our many elderly sisters, as well as in the gardens and as one of the monastery's drivers, and became one of the mainstays of the monastery choir.

Sister Anna, as she was then known, was much loved for her kindness and consideration, especially in nursing the sisters, and was greatly respected for her serious and sober approach to the monastic life and for the fervor of her faith. The scars from her first cancer surgery never healed properly and a recurrence of the disease was a constant fear.

By last Paskha it was evident that Mother Elizabeth was ill. She had made plans to go to London for a cataract operation two weeks later and everyone hoped that she would get proper medical attention, some rest, and would soon be back. But towards the end of her stay she had to be hospitalized, and it soon became evident that her illness was terminal.

With the blessings of Archbishop Mark and Bishop Ambroise, and of Abbess Macrina of the Lesna Monastery, her tonsure to the small schema was performed at the Marsden Hospital in London by Archimandrite Alexis of St. Edward's Brotherhood at Brookwood on the day of the repose of St. John of Shanghai, and she received the name of Elizabeth in honor of the New Martyr Grand Duchess Elizabeth Feodorovna. The Grand Duchess had also been a British convert to Orthodoxy, worked as a nurse and had a great love for the Russian Orthodox monastic tradition.

This event, organized by the Lesna sisters, gathered monastics from almost all of the communities that Mother Elizabeth had been a member of as well as her family and friends. Soon after her tonsure, Mother Elizabeth was moved to the Trinity hospice in London. Ironically, she was assigned the room next door to Metropolitan Anthony Bloom, who had received her into the Orthodox Church, and who was also near death at this time. Fr. Alexis visited frequently, and Mother Elizabeth was able to receive Holy Communion often. Not long before her repose, the Kursk Icon was brought to her. Her sisters from Lesna visited several times. On 7 September it became clear that the end was approaching, and Fr. Alexis gave her Holy Communion and read the Canon for the Departure of the Soul. The last thing that Mother Elizabeth heard was that her sister, also ill with cancer, had had a successful operation. She fell asleep in the Lord very peacefully on the morning of 9 September.

Mother Elizabeth's funeral was held on 18 September and she was buried at Lesna with her monastic sisters.