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Foreword

by the Rt Revd Christopher Chessun, Bishop of Southwark

There is much encouragement to be found in these pages. John-Francis has himself ‘pondered these things’ (as it says in the Ordinal) and shares his insights into the inner life of a priest with great care and beauty. His journey has encompassed the religious life within the Society of St Francis as well as the unpredictability of a parish in east London and has flowed through many decades and different strata, including a secular career in London in which he was drawn to grapple with spiritual questions.

What has now emerged in this book is the distilled wisdom of long experience as a priest, pastor and spiritual director. After drinking deeply himself from the wells of the Tradition, and being fed by them through long and faithful service, John-Francis has now taken up the responsible task of sharing, for the benefit of all making their own journey of faith, the wisdom of the Tradition as he has known it and made it his own.

The Tradition he inherits, distils and passes on is a broadly based one, in which writers and thinkers as various as George Herbert, Maya Angelou and Paul Tillich all have a part to play. But at its heart is the deep hope of humanity this side of eternity, to take the shape which God purposes for each of us, to grow into our true selves, to become the people it is good for us to be.

And within this hope is a sublime paradox: for as our true selves are to be found in Christ alone, and as Christ gave himself up for the sake of others, so to find ourselves is to lose ourselves: ‘We are to engage in a constant finding and letting-go of self; a gifting of self and being utterly present to the Other.’

Realizing these possibilities in ourselves is a matter of Grace, and it is a long pilgrimage. There is much food for the journey in this valuable book: much to ponder on, and much to take hold of. I commend it wholeheartedly, and with particular warmth to those who are themselves on a journey of formation. In these pages they will find a fresh but authentic expression of the tradition that has guided God’s Church for two thousand years.

The cleanest and most wholesome water is often that which has spent years, perhaps centuries or millennia, seeping out of high mountain glaciers and filtering through rock strata, until at last it issues into the open at the foot of a cliff. I encourage readers to draw real refreshment from these wellsprings.