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Three Australian Women See No Age Limit for Strengthening Their Communities
Still strong after retirement, Pam Mamouney, Jane Furey, and Margaret Lenan Ellis are committed to making friends of all faiths and unifying their respective Australian communities.
As members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, they strive to live the two great commandments of loving God and neighbour and show how a lifetime of this commitment brings light and joy to themselves and the world around them.
Pam, who turns 89 this year, has been a member of the Dandenong Interfaith Council for over 30 years. A founding member and president of the Casey Interfaith Network in Victoria, she found organising tours of places of worship for schools, politicians, and the public to be effective in developing interfaith understanding.
When the building of a local mosque was opposed by residents, Pam showed her support on an SBS television program. “I have many Muslim friends,” says Pam. “I love attending Iftar dinners, especially in their family homes.”
Admired for her inspirational leadership in fostering understanding between faiths and cultures, Pam was awarded The Order of Australia for her community, council, and church involvement.
She says, “My greatest contribution to The Church of Jesus Christ was helping all my five children serve missions when I was a single mother.”
Pam’s favourite community service is the University of the Third Age, where she tutors a weekly current affairs class. She also co-organises a group who play the card game 500 each week and was on the activities committee in her retirement village, helping to organise musical afternoons and fundraising activities.
Jane Furey is going on her fourth year of serving from home as a Church communication missionary. “It soon became the best part of my life,” she says.
Jane has a gift for connecting with people worldwide. She recalls being interested in the news as a nine-year-old. Later, as she travelled Asia with her parents and talked to all kinds of women on public transportation, she overheard her father ask her mother, “How does she know her? . . . Who is she talking to now?”
Jane even wrote to Queen Elizabeth II, congratulating her on the birth of Prince Edward, and received a letter in return.
Jane’s life has been devoted to others, from delivering Meals on Wheels to hosting 64 students as a homestay mother.
Her life changed forever when she awoke in the Prince Charles Hospital in Brisbane with two artificial heart valves. As a patient, surprised to be alive and able to serve, Jane wandered around the hospital visiting other patients.
Jane says, “I feel a deep and abiding gratitude, what a gift all these extra days and years have been. I’ve gained significant insights to pain and patience and have become compassionate in ways that I doubt I could have grasped from any other experience.”
While previous years involved being a single mum to two young children, Jane has served in the Relief Society and helped create conferences with 1500 participants. Today, she checks on friends who have had surgery, makes chicken soup for those with the flu, and regularly reaches out to friends worldwide. Though often tired, she says, “This is a normal part of every day. I have come to understand what I suspect is my mission in life; many moments have clarified this.”
Margaret Lenan Ellis was volunteering as a public affairs specialist when she was tasked with searching out and joining her local community interfaith organisation. With no such organisation in Ballarat, Victoria, she founded the Ballarat Interfaith Network. Its purpose is to demonstrate our connection as part of the human family, expanding understanding and building bridges between faiths, philosophies, and spiritual perspectives. Over the past 20 years, the network’s events have built friendships, respect, peace, love, and service to God and others.
Margaret helped initiate friendship walks between the mosque, synagogue, and various Christian churches in the city. Forums with panellists from different faiths have addressed spiritual and community concerns.
Ballarat Interfaith Network has hosted open barbecues for new mosque openings and supported the building of Buddhist and Hindu temples (with a similar endorsement anticipated for the Sikh community).
Under Margaret’s direction, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints hosts a yearly choral festival in local cathedrals, featuring both religious and nonreligious choirs. “The cathedral is always packed, and the feeling of joy and goodwill it generates is especially palpable in the combined-choirs finale.”
These three women embody the words of President Howard W. Hunter (1907–1995), who said, “We seek to enlarge the circle of love and understanding among all the people of the earth.”