Agnes Toe: 'Ministry was a blessing in my life'

Agnes Toe, a pastor’s widow, says she can’t afford repairs for her home and often doesn’t have enough money for her medication. A UMNS photo by Kathy L. Gilbert.

By Kathy L. Gilbert*

MONROVIA, Liberia (UMNS)-Agnes Toe suffered the deaths of her husband and 32-year-old daughter, Cecelia, on the same day in 1991. The two died separately, and Agnes doesn't offer details.

Wiping away tears, she says the two deaths have left her grieving and sick from high blood pressure and asthma.

Her husband, the Rev. David Tweh Toe, was 69 and still active in ministry through The United Methodist Church.

Today, Agnes Toe lives in the home she shared with her husband and four children, but it is falling apart around her. She has no money for repairs and often can't afford the medication she needs.

During a visit by a team from United Methodist Communications, one of Toe's grandchildren is frying fish heads in the family's humble kitchen. The fish heads are the only food she has in her home.

"My husband was pastor more than 30 years," Toe says. "He was a good pastor. Ministry was a blessing in my life."

Charles Toe, one of their sons, says his mother and father were "always at church."

"Their whole life was the church-Wednesday night prayer meetings, Bible studies. They were always busy," he says. His parents worked hard for the church but now his mother is not receiving enough pension funds to survive, he says.

The United Methodist Church, through its Central Conference Pension Initiative, is developing model systems aimed at providing an adequate pension to retired pastors, surviving spouses and church lay workers in Liberia and elsewhere. More information is available at http://www.ccpi-umc.org/.

"My faith helped me," Agnes Toe says. "My faith is helping me because when some things happen to me, when difficulties happen, when I think about the church and my faith in Christ, then I can console myself."