Lydia & The Preacher Man

Miss Lydia had left the island at eighteen, determined to make her way in the world and make a difference. She took a small suitcase, a bible, and some forty dollars in factory wages. She wasn't sure what she was looking for and had no clear destination or plan but she was possessed of a brave and curious spirit, a willingness to work, and a rich streak of optimistic faith.

She met the man that would be her undoing in St. John, a handsome and smooth talking young preacher with a flair for embezzlement, con games and naive young women. In short order, Lydia's innocence, wages and the preacher man were in the wind - she woke in a shabby motel, alone, ashamed, and badly hungover. She might have given up and gone home that very day, had she had the fare, but instead she showered, dressed, and walked to the sleazy front office to ask for a job and start over again. She worked as a maid, a waitress, a shopgirl - hating every minute and saving every penny, bound and determined to make enough money to leave St. John and make a new start. The baby was born in the convent of The Sisters of Charity where she had found not only shelter but kindness among the sisters, and no recriminations for her mistakes, no reserve against her Baptist upbringing. She was welcomed and taken in, cared for and given work, self esteem, and child care. The story of the preacher man was not new to the sisters. Lydia began to listen to the nuns and their patient advice - pray, forgive, have charity and move on. She even thought briefly of converting but the sisters wisely shook their heads at this notion, counseling more prayer and self examination before such a step.

And so it was that at twenty-five, Lydia found herself - due to adversity, regret, the responsibility of a child and the kindness of the nuns - coming back to herself. It was then she met her second preacher man, a widowed pastor from Long Island, with two boys and a small congregation, a gentle and dedicated country minister who tended to see the good in everyone and cared little for her past. She became a preacher's wife that same year, in a small ceremony held at the convent with all the good sisters attending. There were tearful goodbyes as the preacher man looked on smiling, one arm comfortably around the shoulders of his newest son.

And that, Aunt Pearl finished, giving the fish chowder a vigorous, swirling stir, is how Lydia and James and the boys come to be here on the island and how we got us a minister way back in '46. Behind Pearl's back, Aunt Vi added a surreptitious tea spoon of salt and a finger pinch of pepper to the chowder. That's so, she said agreeably,
Takes sin and redemption to keep it all in balance, I reckon.