Editor’s note, 2020: In February 2020, L'Arche International released a report detailing an investigation that found Jean Vanier "engaged in manipulative sexual relationships with at least 6 adult (not disabled) women," and was aware of sexual abuses against women committed by his mentor, Fr. Thomas Philippe. For additional reporting and commentary on this news, visit sojo.net/jean-vanier.
Editor's note, 1977: Jean Vanier lives in l’Arche ("the Ark") community in Trosly-Breuil, France, a village 50 miles northwest of Paris. He began l’Arche in his home in 1964 with mentally retarded and emotionally disturbed people. There are l’Arche homes in Canada and the United States in Toronto, Ontario; Erie, Pennsylvania; Syracuse, New York; Mobile, Alabama; Clinton, Iowa; Missoula, Montana; and Cleveland, Ohio. (See "L'Arche: Community with the Handicapped,"Sojourners, October, 1976.) Jean Vanier is the author of Be Not Afraid (Paulist Press: New York, 1975). On the evening of October 4, 1977 Jean Vanier spoke to members of the Church of the Saviour in Washington, D.C. and answered their questions about community. The following excerpts are adapted from his remarks.
You know as well as I do about the history of communities. They begin with great enthusiasm, they level off, then they start going down. The process raises a fundamental point in our community and in every community: the point of fidelity. God has called us to do and be something and to be really faithful about that. If we lose our focus on that call, that point of fidelity, we will deviate from God's purposes, which threatens the whole basis for community.
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