Читать книгу Do Nothing to Change Your Life - Stephen Cottrell - Страница 7

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

For Joseph, Benjamin and Samuel,

with apologies for not always practising what I preach.

I dedicate this book to all those people who have helped me find joy and meaning in life: to my parents for giving me the firm foundation of sound loving; to my brothers and sister for their companionship; to Rebecca for the shared adventure of a lifetime; to my children for the many ways they have put me back in touch with wonder and delight; to the people I have ministered to as a priest and who have welcomed me into their lives at times of timorous joy and terrible sadness; to all those friends whose lives have inter-cut with mine. And through these relationships have come the little grace-filled moments that make up a lifetime: listening to my Mum playing Chopin, climbing Pen-y-Ghent, a quiet day at Bede House, riding bikes up the Camel Valley. I have received so much; and it is these moments and encounters more than anything – and the grace that is revealed in them – that has shaped this book.

I am also grateful for those who have read through the text and made many insightful suggestions. I read the whole thing out loud to Rebecca on a drive up to Shropshire and made lots of changes as a result. Kathryn Pritchard at Church House Publishing has been marvellous in keeping my nose to the grindstone, my eye on the ball and my ear attuned to the central purpose of this book: which is that out of patient attentiveness to the present an eternity can be grasped.