 She was raised an Episcopalian, later joined the Congregational Church, which she served for a time as an itinerant preacher, and in 1907 converted to Pentecostalism.She resumed preaching, and over the next couple of years received, she claimed, messages from "mysterious strangers" and directly from God that she should found a mission in St. John's.Together with a missionary couple, she travelled to Newfoundland, arriving in St. John's in December 1910.