REVEREND DAVID JACKSON (1931-2019)
Passed away peacefully in his sleep at the age of 88 at Saint John Regional Hospital. David leaves behind his loving wife of 56 years, Ruth; 3 children, Pam (Bill), Heather (Doug), and Paul as well as 3 grandchildren, Amy, Abby and Brooke and step grandchildren, Bryn (Ben), Teri (Mike), Amy, Matthew (Robyn), Michael, Scott and Brian (Maddy).
He was predeceased by his sister, Sheila and parents, Ken and Muriel, and is survived by one brother Eric (Joan) in England. Nieces and nephews will fondly remember him as a kind and caring uncle. David Bryans Jackson was born on July 14, 1931 in Middlesborough, Yorkshire, England to Ken and Muriel Jackson.
Much of David’s young life was shaped by the experience of growing up during the Second World War. Middlesborough was the first major British town to be bombed by the Germans so black out curtains, gas masks, air raid signals and food rations were the realities of his school years. In 1949, David graduated with an agricultural diploma from Sealhayne College in Devonshire, starkly departing from his family’s firmly established generations in the medical profession.
For the next 10 years, he would manage large sheep farms in England and explore the British Isles countryside on his motorcycle. His love of adventure and exploration and his farm career led him to decide to emigrate to Canada in 1959 to work on an experimental wheat crop farm in Morden, Manitoba. In 1961, David’s strong faith led him to once again make a life altering choice to finally answer a spiritual call and enter St. John’s College in Winnipeg to pursue a Bachelors and Master’s Degree in Theology.It was here that this confirmed bachelor met his love and future wife, Ruth Stones, whom he shyly yet purposefully pursued until they were married in 1963.
During his time as a student at St. John’s College, his first daughter, Pam, was born who provided additional study time for him during the long hours of the night when she couldn’t sleep. Upon graduation in 1965, David was assigned to his first parish in Treherne, Manitoba followed by a move in 1968 to a daunting 9 church parish in Manitou, Manitoba, ironically minutes from the crop farm he had started at. Each parish would remain forever special with the celebrated births of Heather in Treherne and Paul in Manitou.
In 1973, a chance meeting with Bishop Harold Nutter from the Diocese of Fredericton would lead to a decision to move cross country to Florenceville, NB, a potato farming based community, thus continuing to marry his two passions for farming and his ministry. With a firmly established reputation for strongly guiding and supporting his parishioners, David was encouraged to move once again in 1977 to a parish in Westfield, NB which had remained without the leadership of a Minister for over a year. His final parish from 1983-1989 was at St. Mary’s and St. Bartholomew’s in east Saint John, a departure from his typical rural parishes.
While David was fulfilled and happy in his parish life, his truly revealed strength and passion for kind, gentle, and compassionate care in guiding his parishioners through times of tragedy or illness was ultimately leveraged in his final working years as the Anglican Church’s first official full time Chaplain at Saint John Regional Hospital, where he remained until he ‘retired’ in 1996. Like many of his colleagues, during David’s retirement years he continued to actively play a supportive and assistant role in his chosen final parish of St. Mary’s until sadly his health simply would no longer allow him to do so. He will be fondly remembered as a man of true and unwavering faith whose naturally soft-spoken, shy and humble personality was somehow transformed through his work into a confident, booming voiced man who was capable of such great kindness, compassion, caring and support as well as imparting simple, down to earth messages to his people.
If you asked him in recent years what his profession was, he would answer you that he was simply a shepherd which could not provide a more apt description of who he was over his career. The Jackson family wishes to thank Home Care by Design, particularly, Dallas, for her kind and loving assistance with his personal care needs and friendship for the past year as well as the nurses of the 5th floor and attending doctors at Saint John Regional who looked after his final care needs with such gentle kindness and dignity.
For those wishing to pay their respects, visitation will be held Wednesday, July 31st at St. Mary and St. Bartholomew’s Church from 7-9 pm. Funeral service will be held on Thursday, August 1st at 11 am at St. Mary and St. Bartholomew’s Church followed by a reception in the church hall.
In lieu of flowers, donations would be appreciated to St. Mary and St. Bartholomew’s Church or Sir Isaac Walter Killam’s Hospital.
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Our most sincere sympathies to the family and friends of Reverend David Jackson July 14 1931 July 27 2019 (age 88)..
Death notice for the town of: Saint-John, Province: Nouveau-Brunswick