As a lover of the spoken and written word I cannot help sharing a speech I’ve heard, or an essay I’ve read, with as many people as possible. And although I have my hesitations about technology, I admit that the internet is so helpful in accessing great writing and sharing it with a great amount of people.
The internet allows me to share my thoughts for discussion via blog, but more importantly the internet lets me pass on essays and articles that convey ideas and thoughts from a more eloquent pen. Today I pass on a correspondence between Ian Brown (writer for the Globe and Mail) and Jean Vanier (Catholic priest, writer, and founder of the L’Arche community). L’Arche is a community that seeks to learn what it means to be human by living together with people with intellectual disabilities. There are no specific goals or outcomes that L’Arche communities strive for, rather the communities are an attempt to live out Christ’s call to care for one another.
Vanier, in these letters, comments on common issues such as peace, prayer, and vulnerability. To our benefit he puts these issues in the context of his continuing work. Vanier’s thoughts and reflections on these issues are ones that can only be forged by an 80 year-old who has unceasingly cared for others and has been cared for himself. I found the letters achingly beautiful in that I hope someday to look back at my life in 60 years and be able to speak as compassionately of life as Vanier does.
Part V http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/
RTGAM.20090221.wvanier21/BNStory/National/?pageRequested=1
Link to Parts I, II, III from this site
Part IV -
http://larchecommons.ca/en/chronicles/the_vanier_letters/
the_vanier_letters_-_part_4_2009-01-09
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