Growing as Servant Leaders Bubble of the Month—Journey Together with Respect April 2015
Engaging Everyone in the Mission Welcome to this new section of the Bubble of the Month newsletter. We hope that together with others in your home, program and community you will learn the visual icons of the Servant Leadership Model which inspires us to live the
Mission and Spirit of L’Arche more deeply. This common language of icons will support core member involvement in day-to-day decisions and conversation and will support core member voice and input in key community decisions.
• The last page of the newsletter introduces the icons using the Bubble Path format. You will also find the Mission Cards, Paths Poster, Canvas, Icon Grid and Clip Art versions to be helpful to support the activities in this section. To access all of the visual elements of the model go to this new link which is accessed through the L’Arche Canada Meeting Ground website. • If you want support or suggestions for how to engage your home, program or community with this material contact Amy Demoulin (English support) at
[email protected] or Louise Provost (French support) at
[email protected].
Getting to Know the Icons – Fun & Games
Select some activities from the list below to become familiar with the icons and their meanings.
Can you draw the icon? What is your creative interpretation, drawing or sculpture of each icon?
grid. As you learn more of the icons each month this will get more and more challenging!
Icon Tableau – Get everyone to act out each icon. Have someone read out the aspiration that corresponds to each icon (see Bubble Path) as others hold their pose. Have someone read out the description of each icon (see Mission Cards) as others hold their pose. Take photos and post them on your wall.
Mission Card Guessing Game –
Wall Art & Floor Art – Recreate the Bubble Path on a bigger scale on the wall or floor of your home/program. Be creative!
Mix and Match – Cut the titles from the icons. Now try to match the icon with the right title. Cut the aspiration words (in the oval) from the Bubble Path. Now try to match them with the right icon.
Icon Art – Everyone can be an artist.
Each person has a Mission Card face down in front of them. Give a clue, verbal or acted, and see if others can guess what card you have.
Icon Song – Can you think of a song
that reminds you of each icon. Maybe there is a song that has the title word in it? Can you take a familiar tune and write new words related to the icons?
Icon Grid Bingo – Cut up one set of
the icons using the Icon Grid. Print off another full copy of the Icon Grid. Pull the cut up icons out of a hat or bowl and have the group match them to the 1
Icon Memories – Remember and
share times when someone from your home or program lived the Mission and Spirit of L’Arche in a way that is related to one of the icons.
Canvas Art – Create your own interpretation using the Canvas. Add photos of people from your home or program. Add quotes from Jean Vanier. Add stories or memories from your home or program.
Include Me! - Core Members as Partners
Reflection Questions
At L’Arche we aspire to listen to the voices and intentions of everyone in our community. We aspire to include everyone in making the decisions that affect them and to build on one another’s ideas. How can the visual icons of the Servant Leadership Model support even more inclusion in your home, program and community? What are the mindsets and habits that you can improve to better engage and include core members?
Kindness & Respect
INCLUDE ME !
3. We can show respect to each other in many ways. Share about a time when you were promised something that didn’t happen. How did you feel? Do you ever make commitments you can’t keep? How do you handle it when that happens? Forgiving
I N C L U D E M E
1.
How do you support and help members of your home, program, or community when you see that someone needs help?
2. Trust means that we are willing to rely on each other’s actions. It involves taking a risk, because we cannot control the end result. What makes you willing to take the risk to trust others? How do you build trust? How do you show others that you can be trusted?
Invite – You remember to ask my opinion when there is a decision to be made. Notice – Your ears and eyes are always open so that you catch my verbal and non-verbal messages. Collaboration – You are willing to be flexible and build on my ideas. Listening – You create the time and space and are mindful of how you can best learn what it is I have to say. Understanding – You learn my language and help me learn yours so that we understand one another. Day-to-Day – Your efforts to include me are evident dayto-day and for decisions big and small. Excitement – You celebrate the difference my opinions make. Meetings – You arrange meetings and other processes so that they are inclusive. Esteem – You respect my years of living in community at L’Arche.
1.
Living together is not always easy! How do you forgive on a daily basis (gestures, words, actions, etc.)? Do you recognize ways in which you are forgiven?
2. Does your home/program/community practice any rituals of forgiveness (like the example on page 2)? Listening and Communicating 1.
In your home, program, or community is there time and space for each person to be heard? How do you listen to those who do not speak with words? How do you make sure you are communicating clearly? Partnership 1.
What decisions in your home, program and community are you part of? What other decisions do you want to take part in? How can we make sure more people are consulted more of the time? Do you let others help you make decisions?
Homes, Programs & Community Gatherings “Journey Together” Stepping Stones: As a home or community – Make a long path on the floor (out of paper). Make coloured stepping stones that will pave your path. Each person gets to write or draw on 2 stepping stones. On the first write or draw the things you do for others that make their journey smooth and respectful. On your second stone write or draw the things others do for you to make your journey together along the path smooth and respectful. Use words from p. 5 of the Servant Leadership Model. Tape the stepping stones to the
path. Take a picture of everyone in the home, program or community journeying together along the L’Arche path. Listen with more than your ears: The Chinese Character for “listen” includes the characters for Ear, Heart, Undivided Attention, Eyes and You. Reflect on what each character means. Why are all 5 of these things important for listening? What do you think the word “Listen” should look like? Cut out pictures from a magazine or put together a collage of images on your computer. 2
“You listen with your ears but you also have to listen with your eyes”. – Core Member from L’Arche Canada, L’Arche Servant Leadership Model.
• • •
Light a Candle of Forgiveness: At the dinner table or at a community meeting. Forgiveness is the intentional and voluntary process by which a victim
undergoes a change in feelings and attitude regarding an offense, lets go of negative emotions such as revenge, with an increased ability to wish the offender well. (Wikipedia, Forgiveness, 2013) With this spirit of forgiveness in mind, each person lights three candles silently and after reflecting alone on the following questions. • Is there someone who has offended me who I can forgive so that we can move forward in a better way? • Is there someone I have offended who can I seek forgiveness from so that we can move forward in a better way? • Is there something I have done that I can forgive myself for and let go of so that I can move forward in a better way?
Movies: Forrest Gump Notice how Forrest forgives by accepting others’ humanness, forgoing blaming, and just letting bygones be bygones. Ice Age What challenges do these characters have in their journey together? Finding Nemo Which of the L’Arche values of trust, kindness, patience, respect for time and effort, resolving conflict, forgiving, listening, communicating well and collaborating show up in this story?
seventy times seven.” Matthew 18:21-22. Jesus told Peter that he needed to forgive and keep on forgiving. This is important advice for L’Arche homes, programs and communities where we share life together. Find something that you can do 70x7 =490 times! Buy 500 Jelly Beans and a Plastic Jar. Have each member of the home, program or community put jelly beans in the jar, 7 at a time. Seven times seventy is a lot of forgiving. Keep the jar nearby to remind you to forgive one more time!
Jelly Beans - Seventy times Seven: “Then Peter came to Him and said, “Lord, how often shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? Up to seven times?” Jesus said to him, “I do not say to you, up to seven times, but up to
Leadership, Team Meetings, Training Read the material from the Intellectual Engagement section and consider the following questions together: 1. Given that forgiving is so challenging, what can we do in advance to avoid a conflict, to avoid offending others, to avoid being offended ourselves? 2. In Jim Lapp’s reflection he asks why is it that assistants can easily forgive the members with a disability their transgressions yet find it difficult to forgive each other. Why do you think this is? What can you do about this?
Services Scriptures
Ephesians 4: 31-32 Get rid of all bitterness, rage, anger, harsh words, and slander, as well as all types of evil behavior. Instead, be kind to each other, tender-hearted, forgiving one another, just as God through Christ has forgiven you. 1 Corinthians 13:4-7 Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Luke 23: 34 Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they don’t know what they are doing.
3. If you were to write a few sentences of advice about conflict and forgiveness at L’Arche what would they be? 4. The House Leader Role Guide points to ways in which conflicts can be resolved and forgiveness lived in community. What else can you do in your community to support this?
Colossians 3:13 Make allowance for each other’s faults, and forgive anyone who offends you. Remember, the Lord forgave you, so you must forgive others. 1 Corinthians 1:10 I appeal to you brothers and sisters in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree with one another in what you say and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be united in mind and thought. “In a controversy the instant we feel anger we have already ceased striving for the truth, and have begun striving for ourselves.”~Buddha “Hatred does not cease through hatred at any time. Hatred ceases through love”~Buddha Thus saith the Lord, “Verily those who are patient in adversity and forgive wrongs, are the doers of excellence.” ~Prophet Muhammad 3
“If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other.”~Mother Teresa “Each one has to find his peace from within. And peace to be real must be unaffected by outside circumstances… Peace is its own reward” ~Mahatma Gandhi
Prayers
Oh God you are the God of love unity and peace, have mercy on us. Help us cultivate togetherness within our community. Oh God help us to strive to do your will as you have called us to do. Grant that we may walk together in peace and remove any barriers that divide us. Help us flee from discord, and bring joy to those that hurt that we may bring honour to your holy name. Gift us this day oh God with peace and unity in our home as we celebrate the birth of the Prince of Peace. Amen
An Intellectual Engagement Resolving conflict and forgiving is a natural part of community living and indeed all living. Most religions include teachings on forgiveness; both human forgiveness of one another and divine forgiveness. Jean Vanier has often reflected on and written about conflict and forgiving at L’Arche. Jim Lapp, the Community Leader of L’Arche Winnipeg, writes about his continuing struggle with forgiveness, a common struggle for many of us.
In any relationship, community or workplace, conflicts are a natural outcome of a variety of factors. L’Arche is a complex community; it consists of personal relationships of people from differing cultural and family backgrounds, living together and working together. It is only natural that certain kinds of conflicts will arise. We understand that conflict can either destroy community life, or it can be the fertile soil which allows for growth into deeper relationships and new understanding.
On Forgiveness—Reflection by Jim Lapp, Community Leader, L’Arche Winnipeg (Dec 2013) “Love one another as I have loved you.” John 13 Like many of the members of L’Arche I have learned a great deal about forgiveness from our members with a disability. The longer term members with a disability know that Jesus loves each one of them, each one of us for that matter, and that they are accepted by Him as they are in all their humanity. Because they know that they are forgiven they are able so readily to forgive the rest of us. Friendship is what is most important to them. They teach us that those things like politics, religion and competency that divide humanity are not all that important. Thirty nine years ago, when I first came to L’Arche Winnipeg I immediately felt at home and accepted for who I was. I worked at ARC Industries, the day program of most of our members with a disability. As an Assistant I was responsible for assisting three men with a disability with their morning routines. They could be particularly slow. I was worried about getting to the bus stop and to work on time.
As I pressured them to hurry up I received some resistance and many scowls. Looking back I realize I didn’t always handle the situation the best way I could. Despite my shortcomings, invariably I was forgiven my pushiness even before we reached the bus stop. Now as community leader I am often reminded how easily we as assistants are able to forgive the members with a disability their transgressions and how difficult we find it to forgive each other. Why is this? Is it because we have not accepted our own humanity, our own shortcomings and thus cannot accept the shortcomings of others like ourselves? Is it because we have unrealistic expectations of ourselves and thus others? I believe for myself both are true. I have been struggling with forgiveness for most of my 62 years on this earth despite my experiences of forgiveness at L’Arche going back 39 years. I am still struggling with it. But
Rembrandt - Return of the Prodigal Son
in my better moments I know, like our members with a disability, that Jesus does forgive me and in those moments I can readily forgive myself and those around me. Hopefully as I continue on my journey here on earth I will have more of those moments
4. “To forgive is to recognize once again-after separationthe covenant that binds us together with those we do not get along with well.... It is to give them space in our hearts. That is why it is never easy to forgive. We too must change.” Jean Vanier Community & Growth
1. “Forgiveness and celebration are at the heart of community. These are the two faces of love.” Jean Vanier, Community & Growth 2. “Community is the place of forgiveness. In spite of all trust we may have in one another, there are always words that wound, self-promoting attitudes, situations where susceptibilities clash. That is why living together implies a cross, a constant effort, an acceptance which is daily, and mutual forgiveness” Jean Vanier Community & Growth
5. “I believe that there are 3 principles underlying forgiveness: 1)There can be no forgiveness of ourselves or of others unless we believe that we are all part of a common humanity. 2) To forgive means to believe that each of us can evolve and change. 3)To forgive is to yearn for unity and peace” Jean Vanier Becoming Human
3. “If we come into community without knowing that the reason we come is to learn to forgive and be forgiven seven times seventy-seven times, we will soon be disappointed” Jean Vanier Community & Growth 4
7. “Forgiveness is a catalyst creating the atmosphere necessary for a fresh start and a new beginning” Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
6. When I say that forgiveness is at the heart of community, I do not mean we have to learn to say simply, “You’re a nuisance but I forgive you.” It means discovering that I too am in part the cause of your being a nuisance, because I have dominated you, hurt you, brought fear up in you or because I haven’t listened to you, or was not open to you. Forgiveness is not just saying, “I forgive you because you slammed the door.” It’s also: “I’m working on changing myself, because I have hurt you.” We’re all wounded people, and so consciously or unconsciously we can and do hurt each other. Jean Vanier, From Brokenness to Community
8. “To forgive is to set a prisoner free and discover that the prisoner was you.” Lewis B. Smedes 9. “Forgiveness is the final form of love.” Reinhold Niebuhr
Board Meetings
Collaboration is an essential part of the journey together. Look as the responses to the question “How do you collaborate?” in the L’Arche Servant Leadership Model and reflect on the following questions: 1) How can we as a Board collaborate better with our Community Leader and Community? 2) How can we as a Board collaborate better with other L’Arche Leaders mandated to carry authority for L’Arche’s Mission? 3) How can we as a Board collaborate better with other L’Arche Boards?
Personal Growth
Do you honour those you are travelling with by treating them with kindness and love? Reflection Exercise: Look at the “Journey Together” page of the L’Arche Servant Leadership Model.
Journey Together with Respect—Reflection by Louisa Fiorino, L’Arche London (Dec 2013) For each man and woman who answers the call to L’Arche, it is the start of an extraordinary adventure. Most of us come with these grandiose ideas of changing the world and the way it encounters people with disabilities. We yearn to make a difference in people’s lives, so that that they will know what it means to be wanted, to be loved, to have dignity and respect. Often these ideas can create an imbalance between core members and assistants. Assistants with all their good intentions can only see one side of the journey, often blind to the wounds they carry. Once we make the choice to enter into mutual relationship, respect, and communion something begins to change. The seeds of transformation begin to be planted and the road is walked side by side with Core members. Through the unconditional love and forgiveness that core members offer us we begin to face our deepest hurts. We begin to acknowledge our own disabilities and how we will embrace them. We began to see we came to serve but ended up being pilgrims on a journey together, as one.
A. Circle in blue three phrases where you think you shine the most; ways in which you consistently respect others on your journey together. For each of these areas write out: • How do the others in your home/program/ community benefit from each of these strengths? • How can you use these strengths more often or in different ways? B. Circle in red three phrases where you most see yourself needing to improve; ways in which you tend to put bumps in the path of others journey together with you. For each of these areas write out:
• How does each of these behaviors impact on the others in your home/program/community?
• What can you change so that you are journeying together with others with more respect?
5
6
Kindness & Respect
… collaboration & flexibility
We include and build on others’ ideas
… openness & dialogue
We work through tensions and difficulties in relationships while ensuring dignity for all
Journey Together with Respect
Listen & Communicate
Forgiving
…thoughtfulness and patience
We help one another and build positive, supportive relationships
Partnership
… honesty & understanding
We listen to the voices and intentions of others
We care about how our actions affect others