Born in Toronto, Canada, J.A. (Jack) McLean is an independent scholar and poet living in Ottawa. After completing studies in French literature at the Sorbonne in Paris,he graduated with distinction from the University of Ottawa (M.A. History of Religions 1972), concentrating in world religions.

A Celestial Burning is his third book. He has also written various academic articles and essays in the fields of Bahá’í theology and spirituality. Mr. McLean is a former winner of the creative writing award fromthe Association for Bahá’í Studies, North America. He is the current convener of the Ottawa Creative Writers’ Group which published its most recent collection of poems, Markings, in 2011. Mr. McLean is the current Bahá’í respondent for the weekly “Ask the Religion Experts” page of the Ottawa Citizen, one of Canada’s national newspapers.