Mother of Invention

Mother Teresa and the Franciscan Servants of Jesus

Bridget Gillard

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Hardback

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English

Sacristy Press
01 April 2025

There is nothing conventional about the life and religious journey of Grace Costin. After a family tragedy caused her to reject God, she began on the long path back to faith through pioneering social work, a solo journey across the United States and a brief interlude as one of the first women police officers. Following a fleeting ministry as Sister Teresa in the Order of St Anne, she met the charismatic priest Bernard Walke, with whom she formed a loving but combative working partnership before experiencing a calling to create a religious Order unlike any that had existed before. Her quest took her from remote parishes in Cornwall to the slums of Paisley, an inner-city parish in 1930s London and the Isle of Wight until finally she found what she was searching for in the personal ads of the Daily Telegraph—a “Typical Thatched Devon farmhouse”.

And so in the middle of the Second World War, aged 54 with a heart condition and no money, she set out to transform the run-down house in a remote corner of Devon into the Community she had dreamed of for so long. With the help of a series of remarkable women she had attracted along the way, she created Posbury St Francis—a community, not a convent, with sisters, not nuns, and a Mother, but not a Mother Superior.

Mother of Invention is the story of how a woman, the daughter of a bigamous marriage, with no money, connections or academic background, founded her own religious Order which, at its height, was visited by over 2,000 people a year.

By: Bridget Gillard
Imprint: Sacristy Press
Country of Publication: United Kingdom
Dimensions: Height: 216mm, Width: 140mm, Spine: 15mm
Weight: 395g
ISBN: 9781789593730
ISBN 10: 1789593735
Pages: 221
Publication Date: 01 April 2025
Audience: General/trade , ELT Advanced
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active

Bridget Gillard was born and grew up in Devon. After studying history of art at the University of London, she worked in building conservation as a practitioner in London and Cornwall and subsequently as a lecturer in Devon. As Executive Secretary of the Devonshire Association she is privileged to explore the county’s unique cultural identity.