Dear Isobel and Family,

Once again, my wife, Josephine, our three children Sabano, Sangano and Ncuti, join me to express our deep condoleances following the loss of your Mum, our dear friend Anne Booth-Clibborn. May her soul rest in the Peace of Jesus Christ, our Lord!

There are no words for our family to express the sadness caused by the passing away of your mum, Anne! From the time we landed in Scotland early June 1994, from a devastated and traumatise Rwanda, we found in the family of your parents, Anne, Stanley, then Robin, wonderful care and friendship. Coincidently, we were introduced to Anne by her brother, Prof. Duncan Forrester, who also became my mentor and promotor all along my studies in the University of Edinburgh, and furthermore. Anne was always keen to bring forth the memory of her brother, the much-regretted Ducan, a scholar, who not only mentored his students but also would make them friends to feel at home in his residence and his work place! He would take each single opportunity to give chance to his students, he was the very ecumenical and welcoming figure of all academics staff in the Mound Hill,  in  New College.

These qualities of Duncan, match perfectly with those of both Anne and Stanley. As a family, we continue to enjoy our integration in Scottish Society as a shared project to which we owe a big debt of acknoledgment to friends including your family. They were so knowledgeable of the ecunenical movement to which I adhered too from my youth age, that each encounter was a journey of big souvenirs. From the time we met Anne, we knew she was attached to Africa where they both, with Stanley, ministered decades back and were big supporters of African quest for independence and dignity. They continued to be acquainted with the developments of christianity in Africa. Each of my travel to Africa and back to Scotland, was an opportunity to updating and interacting on the new developments in African social and christian life. In each occasion, the encounter was an opportunity for connecting us to new friends, mature students in Edinburgh or any other christian leaders visiting the UK. A strong signal of a loving attachment to a continent.

Anne was a special loving moher! A part from organising meals and baking at her home, she would always take the family out for pincnics, and walk to the beaches; tell many stories of her many commitment to charities and people; she continued to be connected to be informed of the whereabouts of the children as they grew up until they moved away from home! 

We are grateful to you Isobel as you continue to mediate between your responsibilities, your personal contacts, and friends of your parents.Now that they are in the right hand of the Lord, my family joins me to thank God for a life lived to serve others and to serve His Glory on earth.

Then I heard the voice :”S/he who overcomes, will inherit all this; I will be their God and they will be my daughter/son”! 

Tharcisse, Josephine & family