Amy Carmichael (1867–1951) was a Protestant Christian missionary in India who opened an orphanage and founded a mission in Dohnavur. In many ways she was an unlikely candidate for missionary work since she suffered neuralgia, a disease of the nerves that made her whole body weak and achy and often put her in bed for weeks on end. Commissioned by the Church of England Zenana Missionary Society, she found her lifelong vocation in India. Much of her work was with young ladies, some of whom were saved from forced prostitution. The organization she founded was the Dohnavur Fellowship, which became a place of sanctuary for more than 1,000 children who would otherwise have faced a bleak future. In an effort to respect Indian culture, members of the organization wore Indian dress, and the children were given Indian names. She herself dressed in Indian clothes, dyed her skin with coffee, and often traveled long distances on India’s hot, dusty roads to save a single child. In 1931, she was badly injured and remained bedridden much of the time until her death. She asked that no stone be put over her grave, so the children she had cared for put a bird bath over it with the inscription “Amma,” which means mother in the Tamil. She served in India for more than half a century before her death and wrote many books about her work there. |
