Katherine Locke isn't much for storing up treasures on earth. But there is one material possession she cherishes and can't resist showing off.
It's a photo of her in Iraqi Kurdistan, wearing an Army-issue camouflage hat, sitting in a dirt-brown Jeep surrounded by four smiling GIs — and hoisting an M-16 that couldn't weigh a whole lot less than she does.
"They proclaimed me officially one of them," she said.
Even now, the episode makes her grin.
That was back in 1992 when Locke was a mere 69.
She spent eight years in Iraq, nursing Kurdish refugees who had been favorite targets for Saddam Hussein's butchery.
Now that she's 85, Locke has had to slow down a bit and cut back on that sort of adventure.
That's
From her home base, a tiny Denver apartment, Locke plans her travels — a blue suitcase, already packed for this month's jaunt to Cambodia, stands in a corner — and writes a monthly newsletter that keeps supporters up to date.
It also reminds readers why she does it.
That reason is her faith, Locke says. Faith that has led her literally around the world and kept her looking ahead at an age when many might be content to reflect on the past.
"After I met the Lord, I had hope," Locke said.
That hope is what she wants to share with the refugees, the orphans, the mistreated and abused across the world. Her faith propels her, but she takes with her more than spiritual conviction and good intentions. She's a trained nurse.
"When I was 56, I went back to school and got my R.N.," she said.
And her work with a variety of missionary organizations is always accompanied by more than a dash of practical assistance, in the form of medical care, buildings that don't leak, water that is drinkable.
She has been to 55 countries, most of them more likely to make their way onto the State Department's don't-go-there list than onto glossy travel brochures.
She recalls walking through an orphanage literally built of straw, atop a swamp, and seeing the water through what passed for the floor.
"We built them a new one," with real floors, she said.
Starting out all alone
It all adds up to a life well beyond anything the young Katherine could have imagined while growing up, a lonely child crying herself to sleep in a Lancaster, Pa., orphanage.
Locke was 4 years old when her mother abandoned her.
It was around the time of the Depression, and her mother was alone, but whatever reasons forced the decision, it clearly stings eight decades later.
Even the name of the place reminded the children — not that they were likely to forget — of just where they ranked in the world's estimation.
"It was called The Home for Friendless Children," Locke said.
And one matron there seemed dedicated to assuring the place lived up to its name.
Every Christmas, people in the town provided presents to children in the home, and each child could ask for two gifts. To this day, Locke believes that matron made sure she never got what she wished for year after year: a doll, "something I could hold and love."
Not that she complained.
"You didn't dare cry or they'd punish you," she said.
So she cried in the darkness at night, under the covers of her cot. And she prayed.
"In Sunday school, they told me God loved me, and I believed it. I decided I was going to pray to this God that loved me — of course, I was just a little kid — I was going to ask God for a daddy. I knew my mother didn't love me, but I said, 'God, I know if you give me a daddy, he will love me and care for me.' "
No flesh-and-blood dad materialized. But Locke is convinced those prayers were answered — the father who loves and cares for her, she said, is God.
At 19, she decided she wanted to live in Florida. So she bought a bus ticket and headed south. She got a job as a nanny.
She was in Florida, at a roller-skating party, when she met her husband.
"He offered to teach me to skate," she said.
They had two sons and a daughter and adopted a second daughter.
And together, they embarked on a life of missionary work that included 10 years in Hong Kong.
New partners
These days, she is alone again, she says. But in her work, Locke has a number of partners.
She and a Denver pastor named David Clifton have formed a ministry they call Jesus to the World International. But Locke doesn't limit herself or her travels to one organization. She said she lives on her Social Security and relies on donations and contributions from the various organizations she works with to fund her travels.
When she leaves for Cambodia this month, it will be on a trip organized by Transform Asia, an Aurora-based group that works to bring health care, schools and better living conditions for struggling families, especially children.
Setan and Randa Lee founded the organization because they wanted to help rebuild their native Cambodia.
These are bad times for good causes, and TransformAsia is hurting as much as any, Randa Lee said. But thanks to donations, they have raised enough for their team, which includes Locke, to spend weeks helping girls and young women who were sold into prostitution adjust to life outside the sex trade.
Five years ago, Locke celebrated her 80th birthday in Afghanistan. Friends had a big party for her, she said. She had one more thing to ask of God.
"My special prayer request was that he would give me another 10 years to serve him in foreign lands," she said.
She admits she doesn't have the stamina she used to. These days, before she leaves on a foreign excursion, "I ask the church to pray for God to give me strength," she said.
She'll need plenty to accomplish all that's left on her to-do list. Some of the Kurdish refugees she met 16 years ago are still eking out an existence in a dank building Hussein once used to imprison his enemies.
"I have a vision that someday we can build homes for them," she said.
She thinks those homes could be built for about $4,000 apiece. She's determined to raise that money somehow.
Which probably helps explain why Locke already knows what she's going to pray for at the end of her current 10- year allotment.
"I'm going to ask for 10 more years," she said.
Karen Auge: 303-954-1733 or kauge@denverpost.com
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