Jean Vanier is the much beloved founder and beating heart of L’Arche—the non-profit, faith-based organization located in 50 countries worldwide.

In L’Arche, people who have intellectual disabilities and those who come to assist them share life and daytime activities together in family-like settings that are integrated into local neighborhoods. (www.larche.ca)

Now nearing 90 years of age, Vanier continues to live as a member of the original L’Arche community he founded in France.over fifty years ago.

It strikes me that in the frequent interviews and talks he gives about his life and ministry, Vanier will almost always address the following three topics that appear to be absolutely fundamental to his personal development and identity:

(1) Trust

He recalls how at age 13 he told his father, Georges Vanier, of his intention to join the Royal Navy. His father’s response? “I trust you.”

(2) Inspiration

He talks about his inspiration to found L’Arche after he visited the small community founded near Paris by Fr. Thomas Philippe, a Dominican priest. “His presence changed my life, or rather oriented my life in a new way,” Vanier says, “I knew very quickly that I was called to be his disciple or spiritual son.”

(3) Vocation

“My essential vocation in life,” Vanier says,” “is to discover who I am and what Jesus wants of me.”

Is there anything missing?

Curiously missing from Vanier’s essential narratives are his mother and siblings. I could be wrong, of course, but I don’t think I’ve ever heard him talk about them. Have you?

What are your own essential narratives?

Everyone has a story. Why not spend a little time reflecting on your own? You could start by asking yourself the following questions:

• What are the key stories I tell about myself?
• Who do I include in my stories? Who do I leave out?
• What is my “essential vocation” in life?

Theologian Melissa Kelley draws out these kinds of core questions more fully in her book Grief: Contemporary theory and the practice of ministry (Fortress, 2010).

She begins by posing the following questions:

What is the story of your life? What would you describe as the plotline of your story? Who are the major and minor characters in your story? Does your story have a primary theme or themes? How are past, present and future connected in your story? Is your story sensible and coherent? What parts of your story have you learned and absorbed from your family, from your culture, from your faith tradition? What other sources have shaped your story, for better and/or for worse?

Next she asks the following questions about meaning in our lives:

What is the meaning embedded in and expressed through your story? How does your story reflect how you understand sense, purpose, and significance in your life? How does your story communicate what you value, what your priorities are in life are, and what you believe? How does your story express how you understand yourself? How does your story reflect how you understand God’s feelings about and responses to you?

What’s the point?

Vanier’s “essential narratives” of trust, inspiration, and vocation offer a helpful model for our own self-reflection.

Reflecting on our personal narratives is important because it can help us connect (1)  more deeply to ourselves; (2) more emotionally to others; and (3) more significantly to the transcendent or what some might call the sacred dimension of life.

What do you think?

Robert