Welcome Jacqueline!



My name is Jacqueline, I’m German and I have been a L'Arche assistant since March 2009. I live in Little Ewell, a community house in the countryside. James asked for people who want to write an article about life in L'Arche and since I read some examples he gave me, I can’t stop my mind composing new articles about this community life that I want to share with you. So I made some notes and then decided to write them down immediately before I forgot something. Every day I'm here there are more impressions of life and community that I want you to know about. The fact that I find it so easy to see meaning in my life in community tells me that I have found something in L'Arche life which is valuable and something I hope is a strength for me.

Working confidently with people with a learning disability is not a gift that everybody has, perhaps including me. But I've learned that everybody has something he or she can do as well or better than somebody else – it doesn't matter who you are or whether or not you have a learning disability, the gift is valuable and important to the people you share your life with. Whether its good and tasty cooking, good organisation or reflection, nonverbal conversation or just making funny faces – L'Arche is, as I have heard from plenty of people and have experienced myself, a place to find yourself, to loose yourself, to explore new paths, continue old ones, finding new friends and a second family, new challenges and old problems that revisit you, feeling small and growing up at the same time... but experiencing and learning from this together!

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