Kakistocrat

I was drawn to an interview with an American Catholic theologian who was recently (although now it’s several years old) asked: "Who do you think has the most to teach us about being Catholic, about being the Church, as we move into the 21st century?" After reflecting on the difficulty of answering, the theologian answered that Jean Vanier would have the most to teach. The theologian said: "He’s written such beautiful tihngs about his life with the mentally handicapped. I think he has so much to teach us about the patience and gentleness of God, about bearing each other’s burdens, and the joy this kind of openness brings."

Jean Vanier (born in 1928), the son of George Vanier (the famed Governor General of Canada), is the founder of the L’Arche community homes which seek to bring together those with developmental disabilities and those who assist them.

Serving both in the Royal Navy (British) and then the Royal Canadian Navy, Vanier, in 1950, pursued in doctoral studies in Philosophy at the L’Institute Catholique de Paris. Through a friendship with a Dominican priest, Vanier became aware of the living conditions of those who had been institutionalized because of their developmental disabilities. Feeling led by God, he invited Raphael Simi and Philippe Seux (patients of a particular institution) to leave and share their lives with him in his own home. Today, many decades later, there are such community homes in every continent.

Though there are over 100 such communities, Vanier stepped down in the late 1970’s  from the administrational side of his duties so that he could spend more time offering his services in a particular community. He still makes his home in the original community which is situated in Trosly-Breuil, France.

He is also the co-founder of Faith and Light which is similarily composed of people with developmental difficulties along with their own families and friends. Faith and Light brings such people together regularly for prayer and discussion about their hopes and difficulties.

Vanier’s life is one of service to those who have been marginalized in our world, and he believes that when confronted by a broken world, people can find solace in a God whose love is without limitation. In a beautiful tribute, Pope John Paul II stated that Vanier, through his life and work, has "grown to become a dynamic and providential sign of the civilization of love."

Vanier relates a story in which he and a number of members of his commuinty made a pilgrimage to Rome and were granted an audience with this same Pope.

While we were waiting for him to arrive, Fabio, a young man with disabilities, walked up and sat down in the Pope’s chair. It was obviously the best chair in the room, which is why Fabio felt so attracted to it.

It is a lighthearted story, producing an interesting image of such a Papal audience, but it does fit in with one of Vanier’s larger theme’s whic calls for individuals to break from a conformity to societal expectations. It also asks that the limitations society imposes on a person have no effect on those with developmental disabilities. They have less of the trappings that are sometimes contained within our own persons, and perhaps in this manifestation, they greater refelct the image of God. Vanier’s own act of starting such homes defied conformity to societal expectations as well.

It would seem that the Christian life be seen as being centered around granting allowance to God, allowance that God transform us into the persons that he want us to become, rather than simply the ones that those around us would prefer to see.

While Vanier’s life is one of service, it is also one of demand to those around him. He does not ask that dignity be bestowed upon those whom society often feels are disposable, rather he takes initiative and calls for others to do the same. Considering the parable of Lazarus and the Rich Man (Luke 16:19-21), or that of the Last Judgement (Matthew 25), where what seperates the saved from the unsaved is the act of love, I can understand why the Pope would say that Vanier’s life and work has "grown to become a dynamic and providential sign of the civilization of love."

K.

Some of Vanier’s thoughts can be found at this blog in the posts Eucharist and The Disabled.