Father Brian Jerstice SDB

Mafinga - Tanzania

Blaisdon Old Boys come to the help of Father Brain Jerstice SDB, a former Rector at Blaisdon Hall, who had placed a request for a large Bible on Rualink, the network of the Salesians in Great Britain.  

Some months before Vincent Shaw had asked Len Carter what he might do with a large Douai Bible that his family were thinking of dumping.  Len Carter suggested John Ward might be in a good position to know how it might be used.  Later Len and Vincent visited John's home and left the Bible with him, as John felt he might find a good home for it sometime and that it should certainly not be dumped. 

When John saw the request from Father Brian he immediately responded to the Email with the news that Father Brian was looking for.  Later in the summer this year John went down to "More Hall" in Stroud to meet and have lunch with Father Brian and handed over Vincent's Bible.  Father Brian was delighted to receive what he had sought, and from a Blaisdon source.

Father Brian told John he was building a stand, with the skills he had learned from Brother Tom Caulfiled SDB (RIP), and that when he had this completed he would send John a photo of the Bible resting, opened, on his newly built stand.

The Swahili text on the wall reads: 'Speak, Lord, your servant is listening'.
The banner reads: 'The word of the Lord endures for ever.'

The photo  above shows the outcome of that promise, with Vincent's Bible permanently displayed on a beautiful stand made by Father Brian for this purpose.  It now is on permanent display  in the Chapel at The Don Bosco Junior Seminary, which  resembles the old Shrigley in many ways, at Mafinga, S.E. Tanzania which is Location 8 degrees S, 35 degrees East, 60 miles S.W. of Iringa, the nearest sizeable city.