Mothers' Union

Mullally is the first woman to hold the office in its more than 1,400-year history.

She was in Durban for the first time to close the 150th anniversary celebrations of the worldwide Mother's Union.

She also spoke at St. Paul's Anglican Church yesterday evening, where she highlighted the importance of helping others.

The Archbishop says she has seen churches not only preaching, but also going out into their communities and doing more to help those in need.

Father Labourer fills in a form and sends it to the diocese.

Once someone stole a Mother's Union charity box he'd left on the counter.

But most don't kick off.

They just want somewhere warm, where nobody is going to tell them to move on.

And then there was a little group of old ladies who had come.

They were from the Mothers' Union, but honestly, looking at them, they, they, they were literally from the great-great-grandmothers Union by the time that- [laughing] There they were.

And, uh, they, they'd come for a cup of tea, and I'd done that first session, and I walked over to them, and I said, "Do you think you could do that?" And this dear, sweet Scottish old lady looked at me and she said, "Well, dear, if it's four words, we probably can." [laughing] Yes.

Yes.

The following three talks were given at the Mother's Union retreat, at the Austin retreat at Pentlegare on the 29th of September 2026.

The overall title of the retreat was Come to Me and Rest.

And they looked at Jesus' personal invitation in Matthew where he says, Come to me all you who are weary and heavy laden and I will give you rest.

But the church has failed at times in this.

We've taught generations that the real Christian life begins and ends on the church property, belonging to the altar guild or being an acolyte or part of the Mother's Union.

These things are terribly important.

Make no mistake about it.

There's loads of stuff going on to really get the words out there.

The Mother's Union has loads of resources as well.

So it's, oh, look, I just saw a picture of the Mother's Union doing a little smile.

So Prisoner Sunday is the specific day of prayer for Catholics, but Prisons Week is the ecumenical week of prayer.

So all kinds of different Christian denominations have come together to create resources for that week as well.

The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.

And we're gonna do it with a little South Sudanese flavor, hence my shirt, which was made for me by the lovely Mothers' Union of the Morobo Diocese.

They made it a little bit too, um, too small for me, so they had to adjust it.

[laughs]