Dr Enid Parker 1920 – 2016

On 8 April 2016, Dr Enid Parker, known as ‘Asamolta’ or the ‘Red Lioness’ to the Afar people of East Africa, went to be with the Lord she served for so long.

By the time she was born in Edenfield in Lancashire in 1920, her father’s health had been ruined by the Great War; he died when Enid was only seven. Her mother was unable to care for Enid and her two brothers, who were all cared for by relatives.

To East Africa

Enid was active during World War II, serving in the Land Army and in the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force, later becoming a PE teacher. It was in the early 1950s that she came to faith in Jesus Christ and was soon confronted with the possibility of missionary work overseas. Initially she rejected the suggestion: being in her 30s she thought that she was too old!

However, in May 1956 Enid set sail for East Africa, with the Red Sea Mission Team (subsequently ReachAcross). For the next 38 years she devoted her life to the Afar people of Ethiopia, Eritrea and Djibouti. The Afar language had no written script, and so Enid dedicated herself to the arduous work of studying the language minutely. In time an English-Afar dictionary and an Afar-English-French dictionary were produced, and Enid embarked on the translation of the New Testament into Afar. Her linguistic work earned her a PhD from the School of Oriental and African Studies in 1978. But Enid never retreated into an ivory-tower existence. She was heart-and-soul on the mission field, living among the people, depending daily on the grace of God.

Making the Saviour known

Enid’s deep devotion to the Afars did not dim in later years, when she was a committed member of Grove Chapel, Camberwell. In her 90s she was still making international trips to visit them. But she gave herself with equal commitment to making the Saviour known in her local community, organising a weekly games night with fellow residents in her sheltered accommodation in Peckham, right up to the last week of her life. She would chat to and encourage the younger members of the church. She was an avid member of the Dulwich and West Norwood Conservatives and a member at Surrey County Cricket Club. Her warmth, zeal and infectious enthusiasm will be greatly missed.

Enid’s own lively and vivid narrative of her years in East Africa is available to read in her book, My life among the Afar People, available from lulu.com. Typical of Enid are the following two sentences:

‘God gave me to the Afar people and I love them, we belong together.’ ‘It was a matter of praise to the LORD that he enabled me to do as much as was achieved – his provisions made the impossible a reality.’