‘Jean Vanier is a man who loves us very much.
He loves me very much. He taught me about calm.’
- Michel Petit, L'Arche
Living with loss...
‘We all live with loss. It’s inevitable. We begin, most of us, by being loved totally when we’re born — then we enter into a world of loss, a mystery of loss. Every time you lose a job, or something precious, or there’s death, there’s loss. We cannot live without this movement of loss and gain. But some people are so frightened of loss, they are just scared stiff of loss.’
‘You can’t escape it,’ said Jean Vanier, gently. ‘In the end, you even lose what you feel is yourself. We all do. There’s a beauty in that. There’s a beauty even in something like Alzheimer’s, because it is a cry. It’s not a disaster, it’s a cry for a one-to-one.’ - Jean Vanier interview on the documentary, Summer in the Forest.
Today I am reminded of my experience last Sunday at Mass.
“If we are to grow in love, the prisons of our egoism must be unlocked. This implies suffering, constant effort and repeated choices.” - Jean Vanier
