THE WOMEN AROUND JOHN WESLEY AT HOME ... - Kristoffersen

home seven sisters and his mother who was anextraordinary woman for her time.His father had furthermore put his stamp on life inthe Parsonage, so that without knowledge of SamuelWesley, Sr., the whole study would be meaningless.Because of this fact I have had to say something about him.There was some behaviour of the people in thiswork that would be meaningless without some knowledgeof the culture and the place of woman in society.Knowledge of the infrastructure in England at that timegave a bit more light over the behaviour of people and thelife they lived.In this way this manuscript grew out from theoriginal thought of a small address about Wesley and thewomen around him, and now I see that what I haveproduced is only a drop in the cultural sea, as one see thework in connection with the enormous material that existsabout the Wesley family. There are also many questionsthat I have not found answers to.What surprised me is the enormous interest thereis in the subject Wesley and the women in his life.I attended the Methodist Annual Conference inVetlanda, Sweden, 1988. The Conference was in sessionfrom 16 th to 19 th of June. I met many people here that hadheard about my work with Wesley and the women. I had tostand there in the heat of the sun and answer manyquestions.One elderly Methodist woman came and said tome: “Why cannot these questions be presented at specialtalks at the Conference, like morning devotions at the107