| Maud and Annie Powlas (missionaries to Japan) They grew up on the edge of poverty in
North Carolina. After their father's death in 1899 (Maud was ten and Annie eight), their
mother brought up and saw that all of her nine children would receive a college education
by making and selling candies. She also kept a box into which they saved money for
missionary work in the Orient. It is little wonder that both sisters would leave school
teaching to work in the mission fields. Maud wanted to go to India, Annie to Africa.
However, when the board of missions needed two teachers for Japan, Maud went in 1918 and
Annie a year later. Except for the war years (1942-47) they served their until their
respective retirements in 1960 and 1961. The two women pioneered day and nursery care for
women and children living in poverty. They founded JI-AI-EN (Colony of Love and Mercy) a
model de-institutionalized living for these families, providing a campus of small cottages
and gardens. JI-AL-EN's social ministry undermined 1300 years of Japanese Buddhism which
honored suffering as punishment for past sins or preparation for great bliss. In 1979,
Maud returned for JI-AI-EN's 60th anniversary to find an agency comprised of 21
institutions with a $3.5 million budget. A staff of 193 was caring for over 1100 in widows
cottages, children's homes, nurseries, kindergartens, a home for 95 deaf and blind
children, and the Powlas Home Hospital for the Aged. Both women were honored with awards
from the emperor over the years. Annie died in 1978 at age 87. Before her death in 1980
(at 91) after 18 years of trying, Maud published Gathering the Fragments, a moving account
of their ministry. It includes the account of how she and her two Japanese god children
were refused membership in two U.S. congregations (backed by the synod president) after
the sisters fled Japan at the outbreak of World War II.
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