The John Bradburne Memorial Door
Panels 01 - 04
Panel 01
Portrait of John as an officer in the British Army in India during the World War
I love this age in which I am on earth
So blest be God who gives to no man
Choice concerning when and where he'll
Come to birth
1941
John spends his leave in the Himalaya
I heard a sound of singing, saw a sole
Sadhu at praise
John, the son of an Anglican clergyman, is received into the Church at Buckfast Abbey
Our Lady and the Church are as a bridge
By which our Saviour shares our pilgrimage
Feast of Christ the King, 1947
John makes a pilgrimage to Lourdes
It is not possible to think of God
Without the Virgin Mary being there
Deep in the well whence springs
the thought since trod:
On earth that Prince of Peace
who breathed our air
There goes He ever, flows
through time and space
Incarnate, with Maria Queen of Grace
1949
Panel 02
John makes a pilgrimage to Jerusalem
I steered towards a wedding
With fairest of all nurses: she's of Zion
October, 1950
John makes a pilgrimage to Rome
September, 1950
The carvers have never seen architecture in stone. Their attempt to understand the Dome of the Rock and St. Peter's is derived from Fr. Boucher's explanation and from photographs.
John prays at the Wailing Wall
I know the Wailing Wall as none has known
That odd Westend of God since it was raised
October, 1950
John makes a pilgrimage to the Sea of Tiberias
Panel 03
John tries his vocation as a Father of Sion in the novitiate at Louvain
I'll never be a scholar, Lord,
So slow am I to learn.
Yet, by Thy grace, dear Lord, to me
Death's naught but end of term
December, 1950
John returns to England
Rarely not have readers seen
Rural England rolling green
Undulating over land
More divine through human hand
1953
John tries his vocation as a Benedictine at Prinknash Abbey
Advent, 1955
John departs from Prinknash Abbey and makes his living as a street musician, or as he calls himself, the Piper
I have no money
But I love God
In Him I rejoice
Mari handina
Mwari ndinoda
Naye ndinofara
Good Friday, 1956
Panel 04
John arrives in Salisbury, Rhodesia (now Harare, Zimbabwe), having asked his friend, Fr. John Dove S.J. to find a cave in Africa where he might pray
The dust of this Mashonaland
Could make me sing on everything I've ever scanned
7th August, 1962
John arrives at Silveira House, Chishawasha
John undertakes varied work for the Mission, with greater or less success, in the course of which he visits local schools…
… but he arrives, finally, at Mutemwa Leprosy Settlement, near Mutoko, north-east of Salisbury, which is to be his home for the next ten years
March, 1969
