Christine du Plessis – A Life Lived in Service and Song

Meeting Christine du Plessis is like coming into contact with an energetic, lively whirlwind. This is a lady who, despite her share of difficulties in life, has accomplished great things, and at 83, continues to be active and to serve.

Her Road to Becoming an Opera Singer

As a young girl of 12, she began singing. Simply listening to the birds was her initial source of inspiration. This little girl had a long journey of music ahead of her. Talented at school, both in visual art as well as in music, Christine was encouraged to set her sights on Vienna. She was told she had it in her to become an opera singer. All the way through school in Bloemfontein, she studied and progressed, and achieved. She took part in Eisteddfods, receiving many honours.

When she finished school, she went off to Rhodes University in Grahamstown, to study a BA in fine art, and then started her career as a high school art teacher. The dream of studying singing in Vienna was by no means lost, but she needed money to get there. And so she taught in the high school in the mornings, and got an extra job – teaching at the Technicon in the afternoons and evenings. She did everything she could to earn the extra money she needed, including being involved in building ten floats for the Sand River Convention celebration in Bloemfontein in 1952. Her creativity was especially tested when a huge bronze coloured statue of a Free State farmer that she had made, fell and broke on the morning of the parade. Quick thinking, she went round to the local gym, and called upon a well-muscled, good-looking young man to be the bronze-painted substitute on her float.

Sister du Plessis considers the age of 23 to have been the peak of her achievements. She worked hard at her jobs, as well as preparing seven paintings for her first exhibition (all of which achieved A’s) and seven pieces to sing in the eisteddfod (all of which achieved A’s). She succeeded in selling her paintings, and this added sufficiently to her income, to enable her to finally realise her dream – she sailed over to Europe, to Vienna. And there she was to remain for two years, while she studied opera singing.

A Young Opera Singer in Vienna Meets the Missionaries

 

In Vienna, life was not easy just 10 years after the end of World War Two. And neither were her studies. She discovered that she had to “unlearn” everything that she had been taught as a singer, and “relearn” a whole new way of singing. At the same time, she was far from home and her home language of Afrikaans. While there she met up with a group of other young students from South Africa, amongst them – Mimi Coertse.

After being there for some time, the young Christine met with two young missionaries from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. They had already tracted through her building, and didn’t usually go back to a place after finding no success. But on this occasion, they felt impressed to return to Christine’s apartment. Something that had always bothered Christine while growing up, was the idea that God was not fair, in that He gave prophets to the Old Testament people, but He didn’t care enough about us to do the same now. So when the missionaries told her about the Restoration of the fullness of the Gospel, together with a prophet to lead us, she knew she had finally found the truth.

She was baptized in the Danube River on 10 October 1955 at 6pm. It was icy cold and sleeting and they needed the headlights of the car to see. However, the Gospel was then already what it would be throughout her life ahead – “a live, burning thing in her system”.

Unfortunately, her life wasn’t to get any easier after this for her in Vienna. Her South African friends turned their backs on her after she joined the Church. And then finally, her father passed away before she was able to return and see him. In a state of despair, when she had heard the news about her father, she turned to Heavenly Father, and discovered for herself the comfort that comes from the Holy Ghost, and she received inspiration, which she felt was a blessing to her through the 30 years ahead.

Life as a Wife and a Mother

Finally, at the age of 27, Christine returned to South Africa, and to her old teaching job in Bloemfontein. But, after six months, she moved up to Pretoria. The Church was still quite small in the area, and she felt she had a better chance of meeting people her own age if she moved. In Pretoria, she found herself in much the same position, but she nonetheless met the man she was to marry. He was not a member of the Church at the time, but he investigated for himself and was baptized before they were married when Christine was 29.

Then came the real roller coaster ride of motherhood. She had her first son at 30, and her fourth son at 34. She spent nine years washing nappies by hand, while dealing with four lively, active and mischievous boys. Money was always a problem. Her husband had received some brain damage before they were married as a result of sporting accidents, and was epileptic. This resulted in him earning a lot less than they needed, despite him being an intelligent man.

When her youngest child started school, Christine went back to teaching. This time she taught at a special school for handicapped children where she stayed for five years. Then she was invited to teach singing at the Pretoria Technicon – and there she stayed until her retirement in 1988.

Re-Translating the Book of Mormon into Afrikaans

About eight years ago, she heard that a new Afrikaans translation of the Book of Mormon was to be done, and she decided that she wanted to be involved. So she put her name forward, and she was selected to work on the project with a few others. This was a long, but rewarding process, taking about five years.

A Missionary

With the Gospel being so central to her life, Christine found that she couldn’t keep her mouth closed about this precious gift, and this has resulted in numerous people joining the Church. All she has needed to do was live the Gospel, and do the most natural thing in the world – answer the questions people asked. At least 15 of her singing students joined the Church. When her family moved to Wolmaransstad, she was able to share this precious a part of her life with at least 20 people, to the extent that the mission started sending missionaries down monthly, and finally opened a branch in Klerksdorp, about an hour away.

A Sense of Humour

Humour has always been a big part of her and her sons’ lives. Those mischievous little boys, became mischievous big boys, and Christine needed a good sense of humour dealing with them when they did things like switching the organ on and off during sacrament meeting.

She feels that “the Lord has a sense of humour. He put us behind our faces, not in front of them – so we can’t see them.” Whether it’s her sense of humour, or just the goodness of the Lord in her obedient, service-filled life, the face that Sister Christine du Plessis has been blessed with is a wonderful one, which nobody would believe is 83. She still exercises regularly, runs her large house, which she has turned into a boarding house, cares for her own cats and all the local strays.

Over the years, she has been able to keep up her singing, in giving concerts, as well as singing at Church, and the talents with which the lord has blessed her have been well-used to bring joy to others. Her greatest joy now is seeing her fine sons, with their wives and children – all active in the Church. Her sacrifices over the years have been richly rewarded.

              

Audrey Brummer - Safe House Mother

                         Audrey Brummer - Safe House Mother


Most women are nurturers by nature, but not every woman feels able to give quite as completely of herself as does Audrey Brummer. Audrey runs a safe house for children who have been removed from their natural families for reasons of abuse or neglect.

A Heritage of Service

Growing up in Zimbabwe with her mother, Lorna Casson, Audrey was exposed to an example of service – true charity – continually. Lorna was truly a ‘woman of God’ in her dealings with people. She took in children, just as Audrey is doing now, and just as Audrey’s sister does in Australia. The sisters learnt at their mother’s knee that it is not enough to give empty promises and beautiful words alone. They learnt to give of themselves.

When Audrey moved to South Africa as a young woman, and got married to Ruan Brummer, Lorna lived with the young family. Audrey and Ruan were blessed with three children of their own – Dominic, Ashleigh and Ethan. They live in Cape Town and for many years, Lorna worked at a pharmacy in the area. This was the perfect setting for her to continue her life of service. She was at the hub of people’s needs, and was always giving of herself, and arranging service for others. Before she passed away three years ago, she was involved in helping with the abused and neglected babies who were starting to make their way into the Brummer home. Despite being in a wheelchair after the amputation of a leg due to her diabetes, Lorna helped with looking after these little ones.

A Safe House for One Abused and Neglected Baby

Ruan is a police detective, working in what was the Child Protection Unit, and which is now called the Family Violence, Child Protection and Sexual Offences Unit. He has been with this unit for many years and has seen many unhappy situations and distressed children. On occasions he has to speak publicly at meetings at which social workers are present. Six years ago, he took Audrey with him to such a meeting, and this was where the work of what was eventually to become ‘Malachi Place of Safety’, was begun. A social worker spoke to Audrey and told her of a baby boy for whom she was desperately looking for a safe house. The baby was very sick because of the abuse and neglect, and the removal was essential and urgent. Softhearted Audrey immediately offered to take him. He was supposed to stay just for a couple of weeks, and ended up staying a year. This little boy changed everyone’s lives in the family. He was theirs, as far as they were all concerned.

                          Audrey and Ruan - Safe House Parents

The sad part of caring for these little ones is that at some stage they will be taken – either back to their natural parents or to a permanent alternative. When the time came for this first baby to be returned to his parents, Audrey thought that her heart would break. Her greatest distress was worrying that she could no longer protect him. But the law has the final say, and there was nothing that Audrey could do about it.

A Safe House for Many Abused and Neglected Babies

Fortunately for another 60 children, the social workers came back to Audrey and asked her to take in a pair of twins. These babies’ mother was supposed to be just getting onto her feet, by finding a job. Well, Audrey and Ruan subsequently permanently fostered those twins, and they are now 5 years old. Their mother never did get her act together – and her visits to the children became less and less frequent, and finally stopped.

Audrey gets called on to care for little ones in many situations, and in varying states of health. The youngest baby she has been given was one day old. This little one was found discarded in a rubbish bin at a taxi rank. She has had a number of babies who are older in terms of time since birth, but were born at as young as 27 weeks – gestational age. Audrey then might be given the baby straight from the hospital, as soon as it can leave the incubator.

With these babies coming from such diverse circumstances, Audrey never knows what she might be called on to deal with. One of the most frightening for her has been two babies with apnoea – they would stop breathing intermittently because of immature brainstems. After the first one gave them a severe scare, they realized that they needed to have apnoea monitors, and so the sound of a ticking monitor is quite standard in the house. The first baby, who they were convinced had died when they found her blue the first time, is now a year old and looks like any healthy happy baby girl. No one would look at her and imagine that she had nearly died – repeatedly.

With that little one, as with many others, Audrey has spent many long hours sitting in hospitals – Karl Bremmer and Tygerberg. Both are provincial hospitals, because, obviously medical aid doesn’t pay for these little ones. So the only alternative is the government system, which means long hours of sitting and waiting.  But that isn’t the only place that she has done a lot of sitting and waiting. When the babies’ cases go to court, she has to take the baby and sit, again for hours, in the courthouse, waiting for the case to be heard. When the judge has assessed the fitness (or lack thereof) of the parents to care for the child, she might just be given another date to come back, when the judge will again consider the fitness of the parents.

The judge needs to assess the fitness of the parents regarding various potential problems, including drug addiction, violence in the home, sexual abusiveness, alcoholism, mental state, etc. One of the greatest fears that Audrey still has, as with her first little one, is that they will be sent back to parents who are not actually fit to care for them, but who manage to convince the judge that they are.

The Exhausted Caregiver

Over the last 6 years, the Brummers have taken in about 60 babies. Some have been for no more than a day or two. But others, as with the twins have become a permanent part of the family, being fostered by Audrey and Ruan.

All this takes a lot of work. One never sees Audrey but that she is tired – and yet with a ready smile and a laugh, except when she is worried about one of her babies. Her day starts at 05h30, when she gets up to start with bottles and breakfast for the children. The older ones go to a nursery school in the mornings, so Audrey runs them off there, and then she has to get the oldest one to preschool a bit later. During the morning, with her helpers, she cares for the babies still at home, cleans up, does mountains of washing, washes mountains of dishes and bottles, and then it’s time to fetch the older ones home for lunch. And so the day continues – one continuous round of nappy-changing, feeding, washing, bathing, more nappy-changing, more feeding, and on and on.

By the time most of the children are in bed, most of us would be in a state of collapse, but Audrey just keeps going. There is always at least one child who needs ongoing care – possibly all through the night, and Audrey might not get more than a couple of hours of sleep – and then it’s time to get up and start all over again.

                  Audrey - Multi-tasking With Her Continuous Responsibilities

The children tend to go through three phases when they arrive at a safe house. Initially they will be perfect – perhaps they are too scared to behave differently, as they are accustomed to bad consequences, even for normal crying. Then they might enter a stage of being extremely difficult – fighting and screaming a lot. And then finally, they will enter the stage of accepting the safety and love and security that “Mommy Audrey” provides. Of course, there are other problems which don’t go away as readily. For example, if a baby’s mother is a drug addict and used the drugs through the pregnancy, then the baby goes through withdrawal, which makes it thoroughly miserable. 

At the present time, she has 11 little ones, as well as her two older sons, 23 and 18. Her married daughter has a baby who comes to Audrey during the day while his mommy is at work.

Financial Help for the Safe House

Obviously running a safe house takes a lot of money, and with a policeman’s salary to survive on, it doesn’t matter how good your intentions may be, you will not cope. For this reason, a Non Profit Organization was established, which they called Malachi Place of Safety. Malachi was the Old Testament Prophet who said that the hearts of the fathers would turn to the children and the hearts of the children would turn to their fathers. A most appropriate name for a home, in which the heart – the mother – is completely turned to the children.

The wonderful things that companies have done for this safe house since they have known of its existence, have helped not only the safe house. Audrey has also been able to set up a feeding scheme at a local school, as well as providing 10 food parcels for the Department of Social Development to give to needy families each month.

The Heritage of Service Continues

Just as Audrey and her sister learned service from their mother, Audrey’s children, and her sister’s children, are learning the same thing. It is a wonderful thing to see young men and women so willing to help with little ones and to sacrifice their own comforts in doing so. They have learned to sacrifice from their parents. Audrey could never do what she does if she didn’t have the sustaining she has, firstly from her extremely supportive husband, and secondly, from her children.

Her faith in Jesus Christ and her testimony of His restored Gospel help Audrey to serve with the great love that she does. There is a special place in heaven for people who make sacrifices to serve, especially when the service they give is helping any who cannot help themselves.

Corbie Banfield - Heeding the Calling to Nursing and Motherhood

Not many people feel that their jobs are the best in the world. However, that is just what Louise Banfield, or Corbie, as she is affectionately known to her friends (from her maiden name – Corbett-Owen), frequently says about her job. Corbie is a midwife, and the fact of helping to bring new little spirits into the world is something she regards an immense privilege.

Her Nursing Education

Having grown up in Zimbabwe, she went to nursing school (1974-1976) at the Salisbury Central Hospital. (The name was subsequently changed to the Andrew Fleming and then to the Parirenyatwa Hospital). As this was during the Bush War in the then-Rhodesia, Corbie’s training involved a lot of work with trauma – injured soldiers and civilians. At the end of her basic nursing training, she wanted to study midwifery, which was not offered in Zimbabwe, and so she moved down to Cape Town, to study and work at Mowbray Maternity Hospital, in 1978. To further her qualifications, she then went to work and study at Red Cross Children’s Hospital. This was where she stayed, doing paediatric nursing after she married Terry Banfield in 1980. As a qualified paediatric nurse, she was used in various different specialized outpatient clinics, including plastic surgery and ENT, etc.

The Start of Motherhood

Now that she was married a new stage of her life began. She left the hospital to have her first son, Bryan, in 1981, and her next son, Christopher, in 1982. And so began her own personal paediatric work within the walls of her own home.  After this, Terry was transferred up to Oranjemund in Namibia, and so the family relocated, and Corbie as an RN, began general nursing at the hospital there. As a true Zimbabwe-born woman, she loved the hot climate, and, in fact, given half a chance she would live in a permanently hot area, even now. However, she was not to remain in this genial climate, but rather to return to Cape Town, with its cold wet winters, in 1986.

Her Career as a Midwife

It was after her return to Cape Town, that Corbie was able to focus her career energies on her first love – midwifery. She worked full-time, doing day shifts at Panorama Mediclinic until her next son, Daniel, arrived in 1988. After this, in her efforts to be home with her sons as much as possible, she worked part-time, doing sessions at various hospitals. And this was the start of her love affair with night shifts. Being a night owl by nature, working at night suited her extremely well. In addition, it meant that she was home during the daytime when her children were up and about. Unfortunately, sleep all too often has been sacrificed over the years as this conscientious woman has served both in her family and outside her family.

Her last baby, a desperately wanted daughter, Emma, was born in 1993, and Corbie stopped working for a while, trying to concentrate all her energy on her growing and busy family. But in 1998, the call of her nursing took her back to the labour ward, this time at Milnerton Mediclinic, and there she has remained. Once again, she worked night duties, continuously from then until three months ago, when the hospital decided that they needed her as a senior sister on day duty. And so now, the night owl is challenged to become a day bird.

Church and Community Service

During the process of raising four children, being a caring wife, nursing her father through his terminal illness, and pursuing her career, Corbie has actively served both in the Church and the community. At Church, she has held numerous callings, including teaching (including early morning seminary), ward Young Women President, counselor in the Stake Young Women Presidency, and Relief Society President. Never could a sister in the ward ask for a more diligent visiting teacher.

Corbie’s Views on her Calling

As much as Corbie loves her nursing, her first priority has always been her family, and she has made many sacrifices to give them the best that she has to give. The schools, the dancing studios and the sports fields have always seen plenty of this mom, as she has supported her children in their various activities. Seeing to her children’s homework, and teaching her children values and principles, was something that she has always taken very seriously – knowing that ultimately the children have to make their own decisions in life.

When it comes to her nursing, this is not simply a job to her. It is a calling. Anyone who has ever had the privilege of being nursed by her knows that here is someone who really cares about her patients, and has the knowledge and ability to back up the compassion. Sadly, this is not the common state of nursing in our country these days.

Many have been the opportunities that Corbie has had in which to share the strength of her faith and testimony with patients, and with other nurses and doctors. As much as she may be saddened by a patient’s loss when a tragedy occurs, and a baby is lost, her testimony of the Plan of Salvation is so strong that it helps her to have the strength and the wisdom to help the grieving parents. The caregivers also suffer when patients are lost, and her testimony helps her with this, as she knows that there is a greater purpose to this life than may be apparent to the earthly eye.

Membership in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints

Corbie was baptized in 1978, having been introduced to the Gospel by her nursing roommate in Cape Town. She had to deal with opposition from her family on joining the Church, and she has remained the only member of her family in the Church, although she has done the temple work for her parents now that they have passed away.

Terry and Corbie were sealed in the London Temple, when they were married in 1980. They waited to get married as they were determined to be married immediately in the temple, and there was no temple in the country at that time. (The Johannesburg Temple was dedicated in 1985) So they worked hard and saved and sacrificed, and they were able to make their dream come true of being sealed for Time and Eternity. Their children were born under the blessing of this eternal covenant, so they can be a ‘forever family’.

Truly this is one of the many South African Mormon Women Making Their Mark.