When I started L'Arche, under the inspiration and encouragement of Father Thomas Philippe, I never imagined I was founding a communal movement. I knew how to command a battleship. I knew Aristotle. But I knew nothing about people with disabilities. I couldn't tell aspirin from Gardenal.
When I began L'Arche, somewhat naïve and stubborn, I wanted nothing grand. I simply wanted to live with Raffaele and Filippo in the spirit of the Gospel and in the name of Jesus.
"Whoever welcomes one of these little ones in my name welcomes me." What if it were true? What if Christ's words were true: "Whatever you do for the least of these, you do for me?" What if welcoming Luigi, Raffaele, Filippo meant welcoming Jesus? What if it were true? If we really believed it, the world would be different.
Today I am moved by how far L'Arche has traveled from those poor beginnings to the hundred and five communities we have now. I am amazed. From a seed comes the tree, and from the tree come fruits. Yet the tree remains fragile. Recently, our international council gathered coordinators from L'Arche communities across Asia, Africa, North and South America, and Europe. As we faced our many vulnerabilities and our own limitations, we came to understand that a community welcoming the poor will always itself be poor: financially insecure, uncertain about finding assistants, vulnerable to political upheaval.
Slowly at L'Arche, the mystery of the foot-washing has become clear to us. "Jesus rose, set aside his garments…" Picture the apostles' faces: "What is he doing?" Clothed only as a slave, he begins to wash their feet. They do not understand. Neither did we. When we discuss this passage, we speak of Jesus hiding his glory. We always hold the image of a God who is strong—Creator of heaven and earth, answering our requests. But what if his glory were to be a slave? What if God's nature were to be small, and in acting this way he does not hide his glory but reveals it? "Whoever welcomes the least, welcomes me."
If you asked me what I have learned in thirty years at L'Arche, I would tell you: littleness, the vulnerability of God, God hidden, God concealed in the poor, God who weeps, bound by our refusals, hardened by our hearts. Jesus still hangs upon a cross because of our inability to welcome him.
"Do You Love Me?"
If L'Arche has deep roots, it is first of all because of the beauty of Raffaele, Luigi, and so many men and women who could not cultivate intellectual gifts but who captivate us with their cry demanding relationship and tenderness: "Do you love me?" Before coming to L'Arche, I knew generosity. But I was completely ignorant of that dimension of love which is communion—love that explodes into joy, into celebration.
These men and women are far freer than many of us, often trapped in social conventions. Our people shatter propriety with cries of anger or with open tenderness, throwing themselves into our arms. We marvel at their simplicity of heart. People well-established in society do not participate like these poor do in the wedding feast of the Gospel. They are too preoccupied with their projects, while the poor run toward it. Those we refuse, those we would have aborted before birth, carry a message. Incapable of great deeds, sometimes unable to wash or dress themselves, they reveal a truth. A truth that many of our assistants have come to understand—those who have said yes to a God hidden in the smallness of daily gestures. In Haiti, in Calcutta, in Budapest, in Uganda, in Paris, we do nothing spectacular. Each day is the same: breakfast in the morning, work, lunch, then celebrations—and the moments of friendship, the anger, the crying. A revelation of our humanity.
"At L'Arche we discover that humanity is not condemned to war, that difference is a treasure and does not prevent us from loving one another"
"At L'Arche we discover that humanity is not condemned to war, that difference is a treasure and does not prevent us from loving one another"This truth radiating from the face of Raffaele, Luigi, and so many others has drawn men and women who renounced salaries and pleasures and believed in the folly of the Gospel's message. In Calcutta, a vast, painful, explosive city, L'Arche lives in a neighborhood where on one side Muslims kill sacred cows while on the other Hindus raise pigs. There are murders and fires. And we are there, in the middle—Christians, Muslims, Hindus—praying, working, fragile. But we discover that humanity is not condemned to war, that difference is a treasure and does not prevent us from loving one another.
Rekindling the Taste for Life
At L'Arche I learned hope. Men and women who arrived in depression, in anger, were transformed because someone looked upon their human face—people with disabilities, but also assistants. People full of anguish found trust and peace. For our broken world, I discovered the hope of resurrection through love, tenderness, listening. Despite our mistakes and failures, God wants to reveal to the world his mysterious presence hidden in suffering and littleness.
Working with psychiatrists, I learned much about the body and the human psyche. The Kingdom of God is a seed falling into the soil of our being—this body and this psyche. For that seed to sprout and grow well, we must cultivate, work the earth, and thus know the human heart with its blockages, its fragilities. At L'Arche we cannot "spiritualize" too quickly. Human nature includes violence, anger, tears, madness. Because of the many wounds people have suffered, some carry within them anguish they cannot control. Others have a taste for death. Others refuse to grow.
In Santo Domingo, Luisito lived for years on the streets, begging. In community, people wanted him to make progress, but he refused. Sometimes the power of hope must be stronger than the power of the handicapped person's despair. Sometimes we must undertake a true struggle to rekindle the taste for life. We must understand what is happening in Luisito's inner world; where his refusals come from; how to help him, perhaps with medicine, but also how to help him speak and express his desires. This is a challenge for L'Arche.
We must move forward with the fractures, the questions, listening to that terrible cry: "Why am I like this?" We must learn to receive suffering. I have discovered much about it. Together with a team, we must understand the person and find how each one can discover his capacity for growth, his path toward maturity. Through community, some resurrections have become possible. Priests, doctors, psychologists have worked so that the earth might receive the divine seed.
I have also learned much about communal living. It is not easy. We step on each other's toes. And forgiveness, as you know, is not spontaneous. Yet Jesus tells Peter he must forgive seventy times seven—infinitely! Forgive when you carry resentment, when you struggle to accept those who distress you. Forgive, let go of your prejudices. Usually in community, people are extremely diverse: there is the difference between people with disabilities and assistants; between celibate and married assistants; between those still uncertain about their path, differences rooted in nationality. Women think one way, men another. It is not always easy to meet. But if you stop and listen to someone who might threaten your ideas, if you lower your defenses, you discover that you can build—build together without excluding anyone.
For thirty years, I have discovered more and more each day that L'Arche is a sign. It is above all a journey, full of insecurity, where each day we must become poorer. We are unprepared for the future, and so we must lean on the discovery that God dwells in our vulnerability, in our littleness. When we are strong, capable, we have no need of God. But when we are weak, we discover the full meaning of the Gospel, the Good News, the full meaning of Emmanuel—"God with us."
- Jean Vanier, 1996
GATHERING OF YOUNG EUROPEANS (ages 18-30) July 16-24, 1996 MONT SAINTE-ODILE (Strasbourg) You are invited to spend several days with people with mental disabilities from L'Arche communities and with 2,000 other young people from across Europe. You are invited to discover new spaces for growth, spaces in your heart for true relationship with others, so that you can be certain of being loved and able to love. You are invited to rediscover through prayer, work, and sharing that every person, whatever their appearance, is sacred and a source of life. Cost of accommodation, excluding travel: approximately 200,000 lire INTERESTED IN PARTICIPATING? CONTACT Guenda Malvezzi c/o Community "Il Chicco" Via Ancona, 1 - 00043 Ciampino (Rome) - Tel. 06/7963850 - Fax 06/7962104