HUNDREDS of mourners paid their final respects to the "irrepressible" Rosalind Runcie, the widow of the late Lord Runcie, yesterday.
Lady Angela Rosalind Runcie, known as Lindy, died peacefully aged 79 at Watford General Hospital in Hertfordshire on January 12 after a short illness.
St Albans Cathedral was full as Lady Runcie's family and church members attended her funeral.
Speaking before the service, the Bishop of St Albans, the Rt Rev Dr Alan Smith, said: "With her huge personality and irrepressible zest for life, Lindy was well-known around the diocese and beyond."
The pianist and music teacher's husband Robert was Archbishop of Canterbury from 1980 to 1991.
Her son James said her loss was "almost impossible to bear". In a statement, he and sister Rebecca Tabor said: "Rosalind Runcie was a warm-hearted, enthusiastic and irrepressible woman."
Mr Runcie said his mother tried to bring out the best in people. "She had the most extraordinary optimism and energy and to know that vital spark in her has been extinguished is almost impossible to bear," he said.
A spokesman for the Diocese of St Albans said Jane Williams and Canon Michael Camp represented the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams.
A message from the Archbishop paid tribute to Lady Runcie as a figure who, through her "formidable intelligence, her subversive humour and her powerful creativity, saved the Church of England from greyness."
It added: "She would not thank us, though, for remembering her primarily as an Archbishop's wife. She was Robert's wife, Rebecca and James's mother and supremely her own woman, with the enormous gifts as a musician, both performer and teacher, that we knew so well."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article