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Last week I listened to a remarkable man who's turned established ideas on their head. You may not have heard of him but Jean Vanier has changed the lives of thousands of people. As a young man, he was a naval officer and then a university teacher. But one day he came across an institution for people with learning difficulties and he was distressed not by their difference but by their isolation. So in 1964 he brought two men from there to live with him at his home in France and the movement known as L'Arche began.聽

Now, 50 years later, there are 147 communities 聽in the L'Arche network around the world where people with different levels of learning ability live together. In these communities love is expressed across barriers of disability in ways that can hardly be imagined in ordinary life. Jean Vanier's message is that the weak have a great deal to offer the strong.聽

Strong too often means coming out on top whereas real strength lies in the ability to learn from others who are different. He urges us to pull down the barriers between the so called weak and the so called strong. I need to do this for my own good not just as an act of kindness to them. Each of us is hand made by God, not mass produced, and hand made products have small flaws. These flaws are what make hand made products more beautiful and authentic but such flaws in people can be difficult to live with.聽

We need humility to learn from people who are different but the rewards are great. Blessed are the poor in spirit, said Jesus, for theirs is the kingdom of God, the God who hand made us all to be different.