The Botswana Diaries

In January of 2010, at the 195th Convention of the Diocese of North Carolina, Bishop Michael Curry appointed Lisa Towle, President of the Episcopal Church Women of the diocese, to the Chartered Committee on Global Missions. The North Carolina-Botswana Companion Link Committee comes under the umbrella of Global Missions, and Lisa has served on this committee since its inception in January of 2008. It was the first time, in recent memory at least, that ECW was specifically included in a Companion Diocese agreement. (Point four of the seven-point agreement signed by Bishop Curry and Botswana’s Bishop Trevor Mwamba said, “We will support the ministries offered together by the Mothers’ Union of Botswana and the Episcopal Church Women of North Carolina.” To see the entire Companion Link Agreement for Ministry between the Anglican Diocese of Botswana and the Episcopal Diocese of North Carolina, click here.)

In June of 2008, Lisa traveled to Botswana as part of a delegation from the Diocese of NC. The other members of that delegation were the Rev. Canon Michael Hunn and the Rev. Dr. Murdock Smith, chair of the link committee in NC.

Two years later, at the invitation of the Mothers’ Union and Anglican Women’s Fellowship, she again journeyed to southern Africa. This trip was longer and was made solo in the month of August. She spent two weeks working to build the relationship between ECW and the two primary women’s ministries in Botswana. During this time in 2010 she kept a handwritten journal. Here are the transcribed entries from that spiral bound notebook. New entries will be announced via our Twitter account.