Dorothy Edna Genders

Dorothy Edna Genders (1892–1978) was an Australian charity worker and a deaconess in the Anglican Church of Australia. Known as "Sister Dorothy," she was notable for being one the first women to graduate with a Licenciate in Theology in Australia. She provided pastoral care, taught Sunday school, and trained candidates for the deaconess role. She also established and managed housing for vulnerable women. In East Perth, she turned the church rectory into a refuge for women survivors of domestic violence and prostitution. In Cottesloe, she opened a home for the destitute. She died in 1978, in Subiaco, a suburb of Perth.

Early life and education

Genders was born on 27 July 1892 in Launceston, Tasmania, Australia. Her parents were William John Genders and Lilly Louisa Genders (née Westbrook). The family were active members of the Anglican Church of Australia. William's sister, Marion Louisa Holmes, was a well-known activist for social reform and leader in the suffrage movement in Western Australia. Holmes was a founding member of the Western Australian National Council of Women.

William Genders and Lilly, his first wife, had two daughters, of whom Dorothy was the younger. Lilly Genders died the same year Dorothy was born. William Genders later married Mabel Brownrigg, the daughter of Canon Marcus Black Brownrigg, the Anglican minister at St. John's Church in Launceston.

In 1917, Genders moved to Sydney, to study at the Deaconess House, an Anglican training centre that had been founded in 1891 by Reverend Mervyn and Martha Archdale. She also took classes at the closely-affiliated Moore Theological College, as part of her training for the diaconate. The role of deaconess was an important one in the Anglican Church. It had been approved in 1889, as a path for women to be more involved in the life of the church. Deaconesses typically focused on charitable work with women and children. to provide pastoral care to members of the parish of St Bartholomew, which had no settled pastor.

As she had in Mosman Park, Genders opened her home in South Perth to women in need. She was living in the church's rectory, and she took in prostitutes, wives escaping abusive husbands, and women and children who had nowhere else to go. Local police brought women in distress to the rectory, knowing she would help them. In one year, she gave shelter to 240 people.

In the 1950s, Genders moved to Cottesloe, another suburb of Perth. Still active into her 60s, she ministered at St. Luke's Church. She bought the house next to where she lived, to provide housing for the poor.

Death and legacy Genders retired to Meath House, an Anglican-run aged-care facility that opened in Trigg in 1972. Land for the home was donated by Phoebe Holmes, daughter of Marion Holmes, and Genders' cousin. Genders died on 27 August 1978, at the Home of Peace for the Chronic Sick in Subiaco.

The Genders Library in the Meath House was named after her.

Wollaston College is an Anglican theological school, located in Mount Claremont. There is a Genders' room named in her honour at the college.

The Dorothy Genders' Village, a retirement community in Mosman Park, is also named in her honour.