Una Kroll
{{short description|British nun and missionary doctor (1925–2017)}}
{{Use British English|date=September 2019}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=September 2019}}
{{Infobox person
| name = Una Kroll
| image = Una_Kroll_bury_times.jpg
| image_size =
| caption =
| birth_name = Una Margaret Patricia Hill
| birth_date = 15 December 1925
| birth_place = London, England
| death_date = {{death date and age|2017|1|6|1925|12|15|df=y}}
| death_place =
| education = St Paul's Girls' School
Malvern Girls College
| alma mater = Girton College, Cambridge
| known for = missionary doctor, nun, priest, and campaigner for women's ordination
| spouse = Leopold Kroll
| parents = George Alexander Hill
Hilda Evelyn Pediani
| children = 4
| relations = Frederick Temple (great-granduncle)
}}
Una Margaret Patricia Kroll (nee Hill, 15 December 1925 – 6 January 2017) was a British nun, missionary doctor, priest, and campaigner for women's ordination.{{cite news |last=Oestreicher |first=Paul |title=The Rev Dr Una Kroll obituary |url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jan/08/the-rev-dr-una-kroll-obituary |newspaper=The Guardian |date=8 January 2017 |access-date=31 January 2017}}{{cite web |title=Una Kroll – a short biography |url=http://www.womenpriests.org/related/krollbio.asp |work=Women Can Be Priests |access-date=31 January 2017}}{{cite web |title=Dr Una Kroll, campaigner for women's ordination – obituary |url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/obituaries/2017/01/12/dr-una-kroll-campaigner-womens-ordination-obituary/ |work=The Telegraph |date=12 January 2017 |access-date=31 January 2017}}{{cite web |title=The Anglican woman vicar who gave up her ministry to become a Catholic |url=http://www.catholicherald.co.uk/commentandblogs/2011/10/04/the-anglican-woman-vicar-who-gave-up-her-ministry-to-become-a-catholic/ |work=Catholic Herald |date=4 October 2011 |access-date=31 January 2017}}{{cite news |last=Ward |first=Lucy |title=Una Kroll: 'Public protest is still very important' |url=https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2014/nov/17/una-kroll-nun-doctor-priest-women-interview |newspaper=The Guardian |date=17 November 2014 |access-date=31 January 2017}}{{cite web |title=Women's ordination campaigner Una Kroll dies at 91 |url=https://www.churchtimes.co.uk/articles/2017/13-january/news/uk/mow-campaigner-dr-kroll-dies-at-91 |work=Church Times |date=13 January 2017 |access-date=30 March 2017}}
Early life
Kroll was born in London, and grew up in Paris, Latvia, and London. Her father, George Alexander Hill (1892–1968), was the son of a timber merchant with business interests stretching from Siberia to Persia, and a British intelligence officer in the First and Second World Wars. Her mother Hilda Evelyn (née Pediani) was the daughter of an Italian tobacco merchant who had eloped from Constantinople with the niece of Frederick Temple (an Archbishop of Canterbury) before settling in St Petersburg where the couple had seven children, the youngest of which was Hilda.{{cite web |title=Una Kroll |url=https://www.thetimes.com/uk/article/dr-una-kroll-qpsvrn5ck |work=The Times |date=30 January 2017 |access-date=31 January 2017}} Hilda Pediani worked as a spy for the British and fell for "philandering" fellow spy George Hill, with Una conceived out of wedlock, and although her father bigamously married her mother before she was born, he left before she was two years old.
Kroll was educated at St Paul's Girls' School, Malvern Girls College, and Girton College, Cambridge, from which she graduated with a degree in medicine.
Career
In the October 1974 general election, she stood for Parliament in Sutton and Cheam as an independent candidate on an equal opportunities platform.
After she was widowed at the age of 61, she became a nun.
In 1997, aged 72 and serving as a deacon in a Welsh parish, she was ordained as a priest by the then Bishop of Monmouth, Dr Rowan Williams.
In 2008, she converted to Catholicism.{{cite web |title=How a supporter of women's ordination left the Anglican Church to become a Catholic |url=http://www.catholicherald.co.uk/commentandblogs/2015/02/19/how-a-supporter-of-womens-ordination-left-the-anglican-church-to-become-a-catholic/ |work=Catholic Herald |date=19 February 2015 |access-date=30 July 2017}}
Personal life
In 1957, she married Leopold Kroll, an American monk 25 years older than her who had brought her back to England from her work as a missionary doctor in Liberia after she fell ill. They had the first of four children in 1958, and moved to Namibia in 1959, where they became active in the anti-apartheid movement and were expelled from the country within two years.
Kroll died on 6 January 2017 at the age of 91.
Publications
- The Healing Potential of Transcendental Meditation. Atlanta, GA: John Knox Press, 1974. {{ISBN|9780804205986}}, {{OCLC|1094821}}
- Flesh of My Flesh, London: Longman and Todd, 1975
- Lament for a Lost Enemy. London: SPCK, 1977. {{ISBN|9780281035717}}, {{OCLC|4035962}}
- Sexual Counselling. London: SPCK, 1980. {{ISBN|9780281037520}}, {{OCLC|490957151}}
- Trees of Life. Mowbray, 1997
- Forgive and live. London: Mowbray, 2000. {{ISBN|9780304706310}}, {{OCLC|42745584}}
- Anatomy of survival: steps on a personal journey towards healing. London: Continuum, 2001. {{ISBN|9780264675305}}, {{OCLC|46433530}}
- Living Life to the Full: A Guide to Spiritual Health in Later Years. CIP Group Ltd., 2006. {{ISBN|9780826480798}}, {{OCLC|62714687}}
- Bread Not Stones. London: Christian Alternative, 2014. {{ISBN|9781782798040}}, {{OCLC|907086111}}
References
{{reflist}}
External links
- [https://www.bl.uk/collection-items/una-kroll-struggle-for-the-ordination-of-women Una Kroll discusses the struggle for the ordination of women, British Library audio file, 3:57]
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kroll, Una}}
Category:20th-century English Anglican priests
Category:Alumni of Girton College, Cambridge
Category:Anglican missionaries in Liberia
Category:Anglican priest converts to Roman Catholicism
Category:British Anglican missionaries
Category:British people of Italian descent
Category:English Roman Catholics
Category:Christian medical missionaries
Category:Women Anglican clergy
Category:Female Christian missionaries
Category:Independent British political candidates
Category:People educated at Malvern St James