Mary Beth Hardin (1959-2019)

A Life of Self-Renouncing Love

Her brother Matthew once said, “You could drop Mary Beth into the middle of anything, and she’d be running the place in no time.” One caveat: it would probably be some time before most people recognized it. And that’s the way Mary Beth wanted it. Whether it was teaching children at the Y to swim, serving in leadership of Youth in Government, being a Young Life leader, or working at a large corporate law firm in St. Louis, Mary Beth was about accomplishing the task at hand. She wasn’t interested in getting credit for it.

While they were in law school, Mary Beth and her friend Joel used to spend time talking about what they were going to do when they were no longer practicing law. It was then that Mary Beth seemed to know that her life would be spent doing two things: serving the Church and educating children. So she left the law, went back to school and earned a master’s degree in education. Having been certified in secondary education, of course, Mary Beth devoted the rest of her life in larger measure to elementary school children. She started one school, served on the board of two and served as principal of three others. To this day, most of those who worked with Mary Beth hold a profound affection for her and consider her “the best boss I ever had.”

“Peak Mary Beth,” her brother says, was her time at Baltimore Christian School, an urban elementary school in Penn Lucey, a neighborhood where drive-by shootings occurred routinely. Children came from the most unstable homes, and they sought order, discipline and love in a small Christian school of nearly a hundred students, six teachers and one “Miss Mary Beth,” the principal. Her office was a former storage closet with no windows. To be sent to the principal’s office in the warm months in Baltimore became a real incentive to good behavior. Mary Beth was a team builder—she reveled in seeing teachers with vastly different styles and temperaments rally together to serve one purpose: giving a child the opportunity to overcome incredibly difficult circumstances, setting them as much as possible on a path to a safe and meaningful life.

But Mary Beth also devoted herself to the Church. A pastor’s wife, Mary Beth leant her administrative expertise to each church she and Phil served. She continued to teach countless children wherever she went, tutoring them and even preparing them for the SATs. In church, she mobilized women for greater fellowship, more meaningful study of the Bible, and a more profound devotion to Jesus Christ. She led Bible Studies, planned retreats, encouraged regular large group events, while serving as a behind-the-scenes guru for nearly everyone who knew her. Her last role for a dozen years, to the day she died, was as Church Administrator for Grace Church of Greenwich. The last week of her life, the pastor, half-serious, confided to Phil: “Well, you know Mary Beth runs the church.” This was perhaps true only in the sense that it was hard to find anyone in the church Mary Beth hadn’t helped to be more effective in  executing their own role. Mary Beth made everyone who knew her better and more effective; but she would have scoffed at the notion that she deserved any credit for it. That was Mary Beth.

On March 8, 2018 Mary Beth was diagnosed with endometrial cancer. After a year of surgery, radiation and chemotherapy, Mary Beth succumbed to death on March 11, 2019 with Phil by her side. Even on the very last day of her life, she was working with others to carry on her tasks after she’d gone. Her only concern was finishing well the task she had begun, but she still wanted none of the credit—that was the least of her worries. A few days after her death, Phil wanted to visit the valet parking attendants, security guard, volunteers, nurses and doctors who had cared for Mary Beth at the Wittingham Cancer Clinic in Norwalk, CT. As he thanked them for their care, each of them had tears in their eyes. They were grateful to have known Mary Beth, and they fondly remembered her smile, her quiet confidence and gentle respect.

At times during the last few months, when Mary Beth was fatigued by the effects of chemo, she worked much of the time from her bed. Phil would hear her from the first floor singing: “When I fear my faith will fail, Christ will hold me fast; when the tempter would prevail, He will hold me fast.” Mary Beth’s favorite hymn was an old Welsh hymn from the 19^th century by Anna Waring. The hymn not only sums up Mary Beth’s view of the Christian life, it is a good summary of her own life:

In service which Thy will appoints there are no bonds for me;

My secret heart is taught the truth that makes Thy children free;

A life of self-renouncing love is one of liberty.

Mary Beth is survived by her husband Phillip, her mother, Margaret Farrelly, her brother Matthew Farrelly, her sister Anna Farrelly, her sister-in-law Rachel Royce, her niece Jessica Farrelly, and her nephews Caleb and Jacob Farrelly.