What's the book about?


Hi my name is Mark Baird I was born in the small town of Rotorua, New Zealand.
My book is a series of reflections, these are meditations where the reader thinks about what has been written and how it relates to their journey with Jesus. It enriches a person’s faith and develops a stronger character. It is not a personal diary. I want my book to by handbook that can be used at prayer groups or meditations however the long term plan is to form a Society that offers the poor an opportunity to live in a community.
As part of the Columban Catholic formation program the novice seminarian completes a St Ignatius 30 day retreat. This is what my book is centred on. Fr Jim Norris handwrote his notes in six notebooks and passed them on to me. I knew after reading them that they were very special, not because of any glamourous adventure or deep theological treatise but the easy flow of a thinking mind.

My book is guide to the faithful who are wanting a deeper understanding of Jesus and the Church, it has a piecemeal series of dates that can be used as a quick 15 minute reflection. By doing this the reader gets a quick insight into the spiritual world. The time is set during World War II and when the war is raging outside the book barely mentions the events. It is when Fr Jim gets his assignment to go to China he mentions that life could get very tough.
 
In the words of Fr Jim on this/ Sunday, August 10, 2014
"Your nature had as it were a definite bias towards evil. Now as you grew older you forgot your dignity as a child of God/and you squandered your inheritance, the beautiful gifts of Baptism by serious sin. Not only once/ but again and again. You can see that as a result of your evil nature and repeated habit of sin your correct view of things has been changed. Your mind is perverted,/ sin means little to you and your soul is darkened and blunted./ To clean the soul and give it the correct natural view on creatures, the Soul needs much effort and prayer and grace. You have fallen from your pedestal as a Brother of Jesus Christ into the mud and to get it back again the Soul needs much washing, straightening/ and since we are so weak, much help.

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