Corrina was baptised on the19th July 1987, a few months after the Mumbai church started. Soon after that she had to undergo open-heart surgery on the 4th of September 1987. Once she was discharged from the hospital, she rested for a week and then decided she wanted to attend Friday devotional. She asked one of her brothers for permission. He was so furious, he hit her even though he was aware that she was under post-operative care.
When Jim and Mo, two of the brothers on the mission team, went to visit her he threatened them and tried to hit them with tube-lights. He then burnt Corrina’s bible and warned her that if she tried to go to church, he would beat her again. But Corrina was undaunted. She would sneak out to church when he was not around and whenever we would see her in the fellowship, she was always smiling. There was no hint of the trauma she was going through at home.
One day, she waited for her brother to go out and then left the house to come to church. On the way she met him. He was not aware of where she was going so he offered to drop her off on his bike. She told him she was going to church, fully expecting him to get off the bike and give her another thrashing. But he just kicked the bike into gear and rode off – just like that. After that, she had no more problems and no one in the family paid attention to where she went on Sundays.
The persecution completely stopped. It was a miracle.
Soon she took up a baby-sitting job with a Christian family, just so that she could have fellowship with the disciples. Once her health improved, she took up a regular job and subsequently married Merwyn on the 12th of October 1991. She continued to have health problems and has had to have two more surgeries.
Her Dad used to work in the Middle East and he also had another family. He would give his other family everything – more importance, more love and above all, most of the money he earned would go to them. He never paid much attention to Corrina and her brothers or her mother and they struggled financially to make ends meet. Her Dad was very upset when Corrina left their traditional church and became a disciple. His main complaint was that she would have no place to be buried as our church did not own a burial ground.
Once her dad became old, Corrina’s brothers wanted to treat him in the same way he had treated them. So they wouldn’t allow him to sleep in the house. He would sleep outside in the rain and his health was deteriorating fast. Realizing that he had nowhere to go, he landed up at Corrina’s doorstep, asking her to take him in and care for him in his last days, which Corrina did. Now Merwyn and Corrina have four children – Ralph is 13, Nathan is 9 and Amelia and Amanda, the twins are 5. They live in a tiny apartment which comprises of one room, one kitchen and a bathroom. They gave her dad the bed while Corrina and the children would sleep on the floor and Merwyn would sleep on the kitchen floor. Almost a year after he moved in with Corrina, he got baptised and a couple of weeks later, he left this world to be with our Lord and Savior.
Corrina has been a very dear friend and a ‘hero in the faith’ to many of us. We love her and her family deeply.
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