How to Improve Your Personality With the Help of Jesus and Francis
A New Approach to the Following of Christ
 
Shipping after September 30, 2026
 
Fr. Arthur Tonne | Bio
The subtitle to this “self-help” guide of Fr. Tonne from 1949 is How to Improve Your Personality With the Help of Jesus and Francis: A New Approach to the Following of Christ. As explained by Prof. Michael Foley in his Foreword:
 
"The concept is simple. First, Tonne takes fourteen qualities... Next, he defines what he means by each, often beginning with a memorable story to illustrate his point. Finally, he shows how Jesus Christ and His “closest follower” St. Francis of Assisi exemplify the quality in question.
 
The result on the reader is threefold.
 
First, it deepens one’s love of virtue. Each chapter is inspiring, filling the reader with a longing to acquire said quality and giving him hope that he can do so by the grace of God...
 
Second, it deepens one’s love of Our Lord Jesus Christ by showing what a radiant, magnetic personality He had...
 
Third, it deepens one’s love of the saint from Assisi nicknamed the “Poverello” or the “Little Poor One.” Tonne draws from Francis’ biography to show how lovable this lover of Jesus Christ was...
 
Personality Plus is based on the conviction that the most attractive person in world history is Jesus Christ and the most charming of His saints is Francis of Assisi, and that if you mold your personality on “the enticing example of Jesus and the winsome way of Francis… you will have extra help, additional inspiration” in forming an attractive “you.”
 
76 pages, softcover.
 
REVIEWS
Fr. Kevin Robinson
I have been hoping to get the Fr. Tonne books republished for years now. They have proven to be very helpful, not only for sermons, but conferences, Advent and Lenten days of recollection. Each topic is addressed briefly, yet sufficiently comprehensive to be of great value. Every sermon starts with a short story of great interest and comes back to the main point of this story at the end. The doctrinal points are quite orthodox, bullet pointed, complete; and yet any one idea can be elaborated as much as one wishes.

I strongly recommend these books as gifts to priests. It will help them so much in their most challenging sacred duty of expounding the Word of God in the most effective and interesting way. Of course, these books are not just for priests, the lay people who would benefit greatly from reflecting on these treasures from the late Fr. Tonne.