My Life and the OLAs
Monica Manser recounts the impact of her volunteer work with the OLA Sisters over the past 35 years and the impact it has had and continues to have on her life.
Monica Manser at a Bacita Clinic, Nigeria in the early eighties.
As a young 25 year old in 1981, going out to work in a rural missionary hospital in Nigeria, little did I know how much the nuns of the Our Lady of Apostles (OLAs) would influence my life, not just my career but also my sense of mission and ministry. My attraction to the Foreign Missions began at a young age when missionary priests and nuns came to visit our school with stories of life in African mission hospitals and schools. For me as a child, these missionary priests and nuns had a spirit of adventure - “to boldly go where no-one has gone before” - to quote my favourite programme of the time. I was captivated by these stories and the pictures of smiling children gave me a yearning to go to Africa and work there. However it was only after I gained the appropriate qualifications and had some job experience that I was deemed suitable by the Volunteer Missionary Movement (VMM) to be able to be of some assistance in a missionary set up. So, in November 1981, I left my Mother, Father and six sisters in my home town of Glasgow, and travelling with Winnie, another volunteer, I made my way to Bacita, Kwara Sate in Nigeria where I would be working in the Laboratory of St Brendan’s Hospital, a rural missionary hospital run by the OLAs.
For the next two years (1981 – 1983), I worked in the laboratory with Srs Dolores Kearney (Matron), Liguori Smiddy and Eithna Synnott (doctor) along with other volunteers who were nurses. By examining clinical specimens from patients, I diagnosed a wide range of Tropical diseases ranging from malaria to intestinal parasites as well as pathologies like sickle cell anaemia. I encountered many ill patients with diseases not encountered in the UK. However it was not only my work in the laboratory that would shape my life but also experiencing God’s love through the dedicated priests from the Society of African Missions (SMAs) and OLA Sisters who served the people by administering the Corporal and Spiritual Works of Mercy. During these two years I witnessed many miracles, patients who would have died if it hadn’t been for the intercession of prayer. Another aspect of working in Bacita that would shape my life was being exposed to the role of the laity in parish life. This was a truly novel experience for me to encounter lay people undertaking ministries that were usually the responsibility of the priests and nuns back in Glasgow e.g. leading in liturgical services, distribution of Holy Communion, carrying out baptisms and funerals.
Monika Manswer in Nigeria.
All too soon, my two year term in Nigeria was over and I returned to Glasgow. Career wise, my experience in Nigeria was advantageous in that I was employed in Stobhill hospital which also housed the Scottish Parasitology Reference Laboratory and I was able to put my love of Tropical Diseases to good use. I then went out to work in Germany for two years in a British Military Hospital where I met my husband to be. It was in 1991, when he was posted back to London, that I got the job of my dreams in the Hospital for Tropical Diseases in London.
I would remain there for the next 24 years teaching and advising laboratories all over the UK and overseas how to diagnose parasites in clinical specimens. But where could I get appropriate specimens containing a wide range of parasites for teaching? The answer was obvious – Sr Dolores Kearney. By now she was in St Joseph’s Clinic, Nkwanta, Ghana. From 1992 – 1999, I went to Nkwanta six times with a work colleague to collect specimens from patients with parasitic diseases. Whilst Hilary was working in the clinic’s laboratory, I would accompany Sr Anne Harding R.I.P. to the outstations where I would take a microscope and attach it to the ambulance battery to enable me to make a diagnosis. I was happy to set up my mobile laboratory under a mango tree to examine clinical specimens for the parasites causing malaria, intestinal problems and bilharzia. Nkwanta was a beautiful place and although I was kept busy, I always came back to London feeling spiritually refreshed as I loved the company of small community of nuns there.
Sr. Dolores was posted to Bugisi, Tanzania in 2002 and from 2003 – 2009 I went to Bugisi five times for specimen collection. I was delighted not only to see Dolores again but to meet Sr Anne McCormack, an OLA whom I had a fleeting acquaintance in Bacita twenty years previously. Again I always enjoyed my visits to Bugisi and like Nkwanta, we also tended to run training courses for the laboratory staff and any interested hospital staff as well as giving some healthcare talks to the school children from whom tested for parasitic infections. As with Nkwanta, I always felt I was going on retreat and came back to London feeling spiritually refreshed.
Monika Manser (Left) in Bugisi, Tanzania with OLA Sisters including Sr. Anne McCormack (centre).
In London, not only was my career progressing in the expertise gained though my experiences in Ghana and Tanzania but my spiritual life was maturing by being part of the vibrant parish of the Holy Apostles, Pimlico where the Parish priest instilled a sense of community. Also the seeds of mission and ministry which had been planted by the OLAs, firstly in Nigeria and then later in Ghana and Tanzania, were slowly taking hold.
I undertook a Catholic Certificate of Religious Studies course for which I loved studying for. Being a cradle Catholic, I took my religion for granted. I completed a Catholic Certificate of Religious Studies course to assist me in helping in my parish. It was only through study that I realised the richness of my faith. However, a few years ago when I was invited to bring the Body of Christ to the sick and housebound, I experienced a calling and realised there was more to life than tropical diseases.
After completing a two year part-time MA in Pastoral Theology in December 2015, I retired from my Tropical Diseases profession and embark on mission and ministry in the parish. The topic of my MA dissertation was “Ite Missa Est – The Role of the Laity in the Catholic Church” a topic close to my heart since my initial exposure to the role of the laity in the Diocese of Ilorin. Since my retirement, I have become more involved in taking the Body of Christ to the sick and housebound. We are initiating Prayer in Family Life and a youth group for the 14-18 year olds in the Parish of the Holy Apostles. We believe that the Prayer in Family Life initiative is especially important since due to busy life styles, praying as a family can be difficult and we would like to encourage families to pray in different ways. We will eventually initiate a programme of encouraging non-churchgoing Catholics back to the fold.
I cannot end by not mentioning the influence my husband David has had on both my career and spiritual life. Although he is not a Catholic, he has always fully supported me in my Parish ministry and Pastoral studies. It is through our love for each other that I have been able to truly experience God’s love and appreciate the graces we obtain through the sacraments, the people we meet and the Church, the Body of Christ. I definitely feel blessed in that my career in Tropical Diseases, which I loved, was a gift from God and that through my first meeting with the OLAs in Bacita in 1981, my road in life took the Tropical Diseases route. My sense of mission and ministry was also influenced by the OLAs and SMAs in that my career which involved working in the foreign missions has now evolved to mission in the parish.
Click here if you wish to find out more about volunteering in Africa with the OLA Sisters.
