THE
P RTAL
August 2011
Mary Sumner
by Keith Robinson
Page 7
Anglican
Luminary
The name of Mary Sumner is well enough known, but her influence in both the Anglican
and Catholic communions may be less appreciated. Mary Heywood was born into a fairly well to do family
in Swinton, Manchester on the very last day of 1828, the third of three children. Her father was a banker
and amateur historian, and her mother a deeply pious woman. In 1832 the family purchased the Hope End
estate at Colwall in Herefordshire, where Mrs Heywood held supportive meetings for young mothers in the
parish.
The Heywood children
were educated at home.
Mary herself proved a
capable child, able to speak
three foreign languages,
and being musically gifted
as well. Infant mortality,
so much more frequent
then than now, struck the
household when Mary’s six
week old brother died, and
the family’s experience of
this tragedy may well have
sown a seed for her later
work.
education in Rome
It was while completing
her education in Rome
that Mary met her future
husband, George Sumner,
a son of the then Bishop
of Winchester, and eighteen months after George’s
ordination into the Church of England ministry,
the couple were married in St James’s parish church,
Colwall on the 26 July 1848. They subsequently had
three children of their own.
vocation to motherhood
In 1851 George was presented to the living of Old
Alresford in his father’s diocese of Winchester. As
well as fulfilling her role as mother to their children,
Mary did everything she could to support her
husband’s ministry in the parish. She was able to
draw on her musical gifts – especially singing – and
she set up regular Bible Classes. But it was perhaps
the birth of a child to her own eldest daughter in
1876, that led her to call together all the mothers of
the parish, regardl ess of their social class, to see how
best they could support one another in prayer, by
encouragement and practical support. Mary wanted
to affirm the vocation to motherhood as perhaps the
highest of all vocations.
Invited to address a
Church
Congress
in
Portsmouth on this very
subject, she made the case
for motherhood being the
most important profession.
Her words carried great
authority, and many women
went back to their own
parishes to establish similar
groups.
In
this
way
the
“Mothers’ Union” became
a Winchester Diocesan
organisation. The idea
spread quickly throughout
England, so that by 1892
there were 60,000 members
in 28 dioceses.
the Mothers’ Union
In 1896 the Central Council was formed with Mary
herself as its president, and the following year (the
year of her jubilee) Queen Victoria became Patron.
Branches began to be set up throughout the Empire,
and today, the Mothers’ Union claims four million
members worldwide.
It was a major impetus and model for the founding
of the Union of Catholic Mothers in 1913. Members
support one another throughout the world in a well-
organised wave of intercessory prayer and through
many different kinds of practical support for children
and family life.
Mary died, aged 92, on the 9 August 1921, and was
buried with her husband in the grounds of Winchester
Cathedral.
She is justifiably commemorated on 9th August in
many Anglican calendars.