In the years since Maitreya's appearance in Nairobi, Kenya – on 11 June 1988 – at one of Mary Akatsa's healing meetings, I had been keen to visit the place where Maitreya appeared, and to meet the healer, Mary Akatsa, herself. Mary is the woman dressed in blue who stands next to Maitreya in the famous photograph, first published in the Kenya Times on 22 June that year.

In January 1994 I flew to Nairobi with photographer Uwe Piotrowski, a member of the Hamburg Transmission Meditation Group, on the last leg of a round-trip taking in Tlacote, Mexico, in November, and Nadana, India, in December, 1993, where we visited the well-known healing springs.

In Nairobi everyone knew Mami (Mother Mary) and referred us to the "Jerusalem Church of Christ" in Kawangware. Once there, we had the privilege of attending one of Mary's regular healing sessions. There was much drum-beating and dancing, and during the four-hour ceremony Mary came to greet us. We witnessed the healing of a woman who was very ill with a cancerous tumour clearly visible on the bare upper part of her body. She had to walk through the church area, then Mary placed her right hand on her head, spat on the diseased part and the woman was healed. Later a man was brought in who had been mentally deranged for 16 years; Mary healed him and he was able to walk away after 15 minutes.

We had hoped to arrange an interview, but unfortunately there was no time because Mary had to go up-country to the funeral of a church member in another location, but when she discovered that she would not be back in Nairobi before the time of our return flight, she invited us to accompany her: "Would you like to travel with Mami?" she asked, and we immediately accepted. Thereupon she placed an interpreter/guide at our disposal and moved us out of our hotel to her own modest house, situated in a remote area outside the town. There Mary lives simply – the congregation brings water, and the generator is switched on only at night – and looks after some 20 sick or homeless people, providing them with food and clothing and supporting them financially.

Mary Sinaida Akatsa is a simple, uncomplicated and spontaneous woman. She is delicately built, some 4 ft 6 inches tall, with beautiful shining eyes and a childlike, open smile, which is full of love. Charming and cheerful, she is always anxious that people should enjoy being with her. She says that Christ has sent her, because she is the best channel for Him to use.

Mary had hired two buses to take the 160 church members and the surviving family to the funeral in Kwiselo. Apart from financing the funeral she will pay board and lodging and school fees for the dependants of the deceased. While we waited with Mary for the owner of the buses to arrive, a drunken man came to the car and asked Mary to pray with him. She lovingly declined, saying that because he was drunk the prayer would not reach God. The request was repeated and again Mary declined. Suddenly, the man fell to his knees. Mary placed her right hand on his head and prayed with him; he became sober and went away relieved.

The journey proceeded to Kwiselo with two full buses and the coffin on one of the roof-racks. Throughout the journey, Mary was protected by four bodyguards, because as soon as people recognize her they rush towards her. On the way there was powerful singing, and during a stop at a petrol station everyone danced – even I, the stiff Westerner. The songs were rhythmic and melodious, the rhythm entered my limbs, so that I just had to sing, clap and dance – to Mary's great joy. I learned how important it is to experience the joy of spirituality in the body itself. Mary showed me physical movements and steps which at first seemed easy, but feet and hands are difficult to co-ordinate and eventually move out of rhythm.

Mary looked after us lovingly during the trip, distributing food and drink as needed. We drove through the most beautiful parts of Kenya – tea plantations, orchards and forests; there were many zebra on the plains and pink clouds of flamingo by Lake Victoria – until, by evening, we arrived at the house of one of Mary's sisters where we were to spend the night. Mary told us that she had been able to cure her sister's husband who had been all but killed by the ministrations of a voodoo sorcerer.

On the Sunday, all church members were dressed in white with blue stripes on collar and belt and on the men's caps. These are the colours of Mary's church, and whenever she sees a man in Nairobi so dressed she approaches him and greets him warmly.

We reached Kwiselo to find the funeral already in full swing. Suddenly I noticed that Mary had become very withdrawn. When this happens, something special takes place. All at once, the sky clouded over, and the congregation was thus protected from the parching sun. The clouds remained until the celebration was at an end and the temperature more bearable.

Again there was singing and dancing, and Mary gave a sermon. Afterwards she fetched several men and women out of the audience to give them messages. She told a good-looking African woman to stop being a prostitute, since she could contract AIDS. "I know you like being a prostitute," Mary said, "but take my words seriously." The woman, however, appeared unmoved.

After the messages, church members formed a double row headed by a woman with the church banner and men carrying the coffin. Then came the dependants. The coffin was swung, people sang, danced and clapped on the way to the grave, into which the coffin was lowered without the use of ropes, and covered with brushwood. The congregation sang while the grave was filled in with earth. Mary presented the relatives with a bag of corn, flour and other provisions which they would need to keep the wake going for the customary four weeks. We drove back to our overnight quarters quite exhausted, and the next morning started out for Mary's birthplace and other places where some of the incidents in her extraordinary life had occurred.

Mary calls herself a priestess of Jesus right from birth, but has never had any ecclesiastical training. People come to her because they have heard about her great healing powers. In 1983 she established the Jerusalem Church of Christ, and says that Jesus is the founder.

When her mother was seven months pregnant with Mary she was poisoned by the father's second wife, and given up for dead. She had been lying on the bier for several hours when someone noticed movement in her abdomen, cut it open and took out the premature baby. Although the baby, in spite of the poison, was healthy, the father threw it away into a thicket. There she was found four days later by her grandmother, who had had a vision in which she saw the child lying in the bushes and came to look for it. The baby was found still alive but bitten by ants and other insects: even to this day Mary has no sense of taste as a result of insect damage to her tongue.

The grandmother nursed Mary gradually back to health in the face of great poverty and the death of her 18 other children. She would go without the oatmeal soup which was almost all they had to eat, if there was not enough for both of them. She often went to bed hungry in order to feed the child.

Mary's healing and clairvoyant powers developed between the ages of five and eight. By eight years old she was fully able to heal. She could read people's minds, which was a mixed blessing as she could spot dishonesty; and could tell if a woman was pregnant, and the sex of the unborn child. She married at 13 and still lives with her husband. At the time of her marriage her parents-in-law did not want a woman with supernatural powers in their family, so they chained and beat her – she still bears the scars, which she showed us – and drove her away with blows some 15 kilometres from their village, hoping she would never return. When they learned that she had returned to fetch her husband, they destroyed the couple's house.

For some time Mary and her husband worked for farmers, their sole payment oatmeal soup, and slept in front of the barn. Later, Mary was employed as a housemaid, earning 400 Kenyan shillings a month. "I saved and bought land little by little," she told us. "We cultivated the land, sold the harvest and bought more land." Now she owns 200 acres, cultivated with corn, beans, vegetables, oranges, bananas and lemons. She pays her farmhands well because they are good workers. Harvests are increasing year by year, and she uses the proceeds for the poor, because "Kenya is poor and many need my help."

For some years Mary Akatsa worked as a priestess in different churches, but being clairvoyant she could recognize the dishonesty of the bishops, and told them so. Thus, she was dismissed, and even today the churches choose not to work with her; so she has formed her own church.

As we neared the end of our guided tour of Mary's life, it was already dark, and she pointed to a star which had constantly accompanied us, a star which then stood over her house. I could feel the strong love energy radiated by the star, and asked to know its name. Mary smiled, and said nothing.

Next morning, our last day, Mary was ready for the interview, which she asked us to keep as short as possible. The interview which follows took place on 31 January 1994.