HOME IS WHERE THE HEART IS
Hanns F Skoutajan
Love and belonging are undoubtedly the two most important elements that make
life worth living. It is also the title of a documentary film about L’Arche and the
important role that Jean Vanier played in it.
Recently I had occasion to view Love and Belonging at the National Gallery of
Canada in Ottawa. Made by Norflicks Productions and produced by the late
Richard Nielson and narrated by Peter Flemington, it is a beautiful film about the
home for developmentally handicapped people in France.
Jean Vanier, born on September 20, 1928, is a Canadian Catholic philosopher
turned theologian and humanitarian. He is the son of Major General Georges
Vanier, the 19th Governor General of Canada and his wife Pauline Vanier. I am
often reminded of him inasmuch as I live close to the community that bears his
name in the eastern part of the capital city.
After the war Jean visited Paris where his father was Canadian ambassador. He
and his mother went to assist the survivors of concentration camps. Seeing the
emaciated victims, their faces twisted with fear and anguish, was a profoundly
moving encounter for him which he has never forgotten.
He later gave in to a strong inner spiritual calling to do “something else”. Through
a friendship with a priest, named Father Thomas Phillippe, he became aware of
the plight of thousands of men and women institutionalized with developmental
disabilities. He established L’Arche at Trosly-Breul as a community for people
with disabilities and to live with them and those who cared for them.
This was a community where love and a sense of belonging was the hallmark.
The idea caught on and L’Arche communities sprang up in over 80 countries
throughout the world including several here in Canada. As I write I am tempted to
use the word “institution” which is precisely what they are not. Jean Vanier
himself makes his home in the original community in France. The film gives a
beautiful picture of life there and is a great tribute to Jean Vanier and his friends.
There is much hugging and holding as well as laughter and music in this portrait
of a home where caregivers and residents find a sense of being valued in a world
that tends to ignore and reject those who don’t fit the norm. The community is
transformative in that it changes loneliness into joy and hope.
The concepts of love and belonging are needed beyond L’Arche. It is necessary
not only for those with disabilities. There is nothing more devastating in life than
having the feeling that nobody cares and that you are an outcast. Many of these
are found in prisons and what used to be called “bedlams.”
Jails are thought to be places of punishment where the aberrant are “given what
they deserve.” Our present government has instituted minimum sentences (the
sentencee cannot do less time than stipulated by law) and constrains judges
from taking into consideration the history and circumstances of those who have
come before them. They believe that punishment is to fit the crime rather than
the criminal. They are then locked away to set periods of confinement, even
isolation, during which little happens to change them. Upon release they often
leave their cells to live in society under suspicion and with little means to cope
except to return to their old ways and former companions in crime. As a
consequence recidivism increases. While victims of crime and their wounds are
important considerations it is the perpetrator who is a victim as well.
While I was pastor in Kingston living only a few blocks from the stone fortress on
the shores of Lake Ontario, now thankfully a museum no longer housing
prisoners, my wife Marlene served with the Elizabeth Fry Society in the nearby
Prison for Women. She visited and got to know some of the inmates as human
beings rather than numbers. We welcomed some of them on prerelease
programs to come and help in our home. She has a stash of stories about these
people and their lives locked away from family and friends except for brief
visitations. Love and belonging were missing ingredients in their lives.
Marlene attended the first international conference of prison abolition held in
Toronto in 1983. The prison abolition movement is a movement that seeks to
reduce or eliminate the prison system and replace them with more humane and
effective systems that concentrate on rehabilitation of offenders rather than
punishment. It recognizes that our present systems are enormously expensive.
The need for love and belonging is very powerful in our lives whether locked up
in jails or disfunctional bodies. Home is meant to be more than a roof over ones
head, a bed to rest upon and food to nurture the physical body. A true home is a
place where we have a sense of being cared about, where we know we belong.
As the poem has it: Home is where the heart is.
In my ministry I usually concluded worship with a challenge:
Go into the world with a daring and a tender love,
The world is waiting for you,
Go in peace!
He took those words literally. To live lovingly and peacefully is what he and his
friends practiced at L’Arche. As I viewed the film I could not help but be reminded
that there is a great need for such places but it is equally necessary to practice
these dynamics in all of society.
L’Arche meaning Ark, which in the bible was the rescue vessel for all humans
and creatures. It stands for the need to rescue with love and a sense of
belonging not only the handicapped but all humankind wherever.
Spirit Quest Nov. 21, 2014
Feel free to use or to share this essay with others.
More stories may be found at skoutajanh.blogspot.com.
