James Francis Flynn was born on April 26, 1926, in Boston, Massachusetts, son of James J. and Elizabeth Gallagher Flynn, Irish immigrants. He has one sister, Mrs. James Gallivan of Dedham, MA. He attended St. Mary's of the Assumption Grade and High Schools in Brookline, Massachusetts, and graduated in June 1943. During his high school years he worked in various jobs around the Boston area. He entered Maryknoll Apostolic College (Venard), Clarks Summit, Pennsylvania, on September 1, 1943. After two years he transferred to Maryknoll Seminary in New York, where he received his Bachelor of Arts degree in Philosophy in June of 1947. After one year at Maryknoll Novitiate in Bedford, Massachusetts he returned to New York and was ordained a priest at Maryknoll Seminary, on June 14, 1952.

After ordination, Father Flynn was assigned to Maryknoll's mission in Musoma Tanganyika, East Africa (now the Diocese of Musoma, Tanzania), where he has served most of his mission career of 48 years. During his first year of language and cultural studies he served also as assistant pastor of the Iramba mission. He was seriously injured in a motorcycle accident in 1953, but recovered fully and returned to the Iramba mission. In 1955 he was assigned to Swahili language studies and to the faculty of the newly opened St. Pius Minor Seminary in Musoma, where he continued study of the Kiswahili language. In 1957 he was appointed Rector of the Seminary and supervised the transfer to its present location at Makoko. Having completed the first year at Makoko as a four-year Middle School, he left the Seminary to return to pastoral work, leaving one future African Bishop and three priests to finish their studies for ordination.

After home furlough in 1960, he moved to the newly opened Catholic mission of Tarime to study Gikuria, his third language. Six months later in 1961 he became Pastor of the newly opened Kiagata mission for four years. He organized the new mission, built first a rectory and later a church to which the Christians contributed 10% of the cost. He also celebrated the independence of Tanganyika and the beginning of the Country of Tanzania. His next assignment was as assistant pastor of the Isibania Parish in Kenya because of the lack of Kuria speaking priests in the Kenya Diocese. He served there, caring for the Kuria people living outside the town, until 1970 when he was moved back to the Kiagata mission as pastor. Seeing the need for evangelization in a new area of the Diocese, he campaigned for someone to work there among the Kuria people. In 1975 he was assigned to open a new parish in the area. After a number of years of living locally and trying to locate all the Christians and establish the Church, he built a rectory in Mugumu, a Government Center with a large area attached. In February 1981, he was placed in charge of the Kanisa Catholic Mission in Mugumu, Musoma, and built the rectory. In 1982 he returned home for triple coronary by-pass surgery from which he recovered well and returned to Africa. In December 1984 he became pastor of the Nyamwaga Parish, where he lives and works today among the Kuria people.

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