By Father James Maciejewski

Once in a great while, if you’re lucky, a real Christian passes through your life.

Even if you encounter is brief, you never forget it. The memory of the person stays with you as a reminder of the heights to which a human being can aspire once he lets the spirit of Christ take over his life completely.

Looking back over 33 years, only two people have ever made the impression on me – and one of them passed away last week.

Annie Davis was my housekeeper when I was the pastor of Saint Bernadette’s Church in Cedartown in the years 1970-72. What a remarkable human being she was.

For one thing she was faultlessly kind. I never heard a mean remark cross her lips. It’s not that she was living in an unreal world. She was well aware of human failings and had sometimes experienced personally the sting of people’s thoughtlessness. Yet she always found a way to excuse their misdeeds as weaknesses of human nature.

I suppose her life was dull by most people’s standards. She never even visited Atlanta, for example, until the last of her 78 years – even though she spent her whole life just 70 miles away. Yet she was always content with her lot in life and always cheerful, radiating the joy of a special child of God.

She was incredibly industrious for the slight woman that she was. If she ever tired, she took pains to hide it.

Every day she would do the laundry in the kitchen sink, disdaining the use of a washing machine. In the sink, she explained, the clothes were shown “more love.” Afterward she would drape the laundered clothing on the hedge surrounding the rectory.

The closest thing I have ever come to the proverbial “traumatic experience” was on my first day in Cedartown when I returned to the rectory to find my jockey shorts arrayed on the bushes for all the community to behold.

She kept busy with all kinds of unbelievable tasks. If all her other work was done, I’d often find her preoccupied with something like dusting light bulbs.

Father Dick Morrow, one of the other seven pastors she served, tells the story of the time he noticed that his shoe laces seemed to be getting shorter and shorter. Then one day he found out why. It seems that Annie was giving them a regular laundering – and pressing!

Another thing about Annie was her devotion to God and to the Church. From the meager salary she received (having often turned down offers of a raise) she insisted on making a generous contribution to the support of the Church. The only time she would stop work in the course of her long day was to read the Bible. I recall how happy she was when I gave her a copy of “Good News For Modern Mann,” because it made God’s Word so much more clear and comprehensible to her.

One of the best days of my priesthood was the day I was able to baptize Annie Davis and give her first holy communion. Shortly thereafter Archbishop Donnellan confirmed her.

I would say that she’s gone back to God now – except that I think she was always with Him.

I’m sorry you all could not have known her.