WHERE TO FIND US?
To better know Faith and Light you can address yourselves
In Paris: French and international secretariats
8, Serret Street,
75015 Paris - Tel.: 558-45-06
in Lourdes: OCH permanence - Faith and Light
Next to the missionary pavilion
 
Boulevard of the Cave
opened from April to October.
You can subscribe to Shades and Light
Christian magazine of parents and friends of children either handicapped or maladjusted
published by the Christian office of handicapped (O.C.H.), gives every quarter information on the activity of Faith and Light in the world.
Yearly subscription: 50F
11, Street François-Mouthon
75015 Paris - Tel.: 533-91-04.
 
To know Faith and Light better you can also use
- A special number of Shades and Light. '
- on the communities Faith and Light.
- on the pilgrimage to Lourdes in 1981.
- The charter and the constitution of Faith and Light.
- Faith and Light, community of meeting, by the Father Louis Sankalé.
 
- Two sound movies of 45 mns:
- the Lourdes pilgrimage 1971.
- the Lourdes pilgrimage 1981.
- Three audiovisual set ups:
- I need you (15mn)
- The charter of Faith and Light illustrated by a Canadian team.
- A video strip(12mn) on the life of a community Faith and Light.
 
- Cassettes:
- Why I kept confidence, by Mariangela Bertolini (testimony of family's mother).
- I was without friends, by Marie-Helene Matthew (the history of Faith and Light).
- Twenty-four songs of the pilgrimage 1981 coming of different countries.
Available documents at the Secretariat:
8, Street Serrets, 75015 Paris - Tel.: 558-45-06.

Purpose
Faith and Light is a communal movement. At the heart of the communities that it regroups, are persons having a more or less serious mental handicap; they are accompanied by their parents and friends, particularly of young. Members of communities meet at regular intervals. More and more deeper ties are created between all by the sharing of difficulties and Hope, by times of feast, by the prayer (and the celebration of the Eucharist). The importance is to meet again, to listen to the handicapped person so that some real ties are created. So we know each other, one likes the other and one doesn't leave alone the other person, one tries to carry the burdens.
Jean Vanier
 
A Hope
To the handicapped person, Faith and Light shows that he has his place in the human and Christian communities, that it has an essential message to communicate to them.
To the parents, Faith and Light brings the support of friendship that helps them to know their child better, to discover that he is capable of progress and that he can be source of unity.
To the friends, Faith and Light offers the possibility to know the handicapped person, to commit themselves to him, to let themselves driven by him on the new paths.

Milestones
In 1968, a small group of parents and educators of whom Jean Vanier and Marie-Helene Matthew, takes the initiative to organize at Lourdes a pilgrimage meant for people wounded in their intelligence (children, teenagers or adults), to their parents and to their friends. Three years later, in 1971, for the feast of Easter, 12.000 persons coming from fifteen countries meet around the cave of Massabielle. Four thousand among them have a mental handicap. Three days of prayer, of feast, of meetings without border nor country, nor age, nor intelligence, nor environment. A hope is born of this explosion of peace and joy, of the recognition also of the wealth's of the handicapped persons.

The Communities that were created for this pilgrimage continue to meet and be cause for the creations of others.
In 1975, a second international pilgrimage reunites all these groups in Rome. Paul VI confirms the place of the poorest in the heart of the Church and encourages the movement.
Then a third pilgrimage is convened at Lourdes on Easter 1981. With the beginning words of Jean-Paul II, it is a new stage of the deeprooting of Faith and Light in the Church and the society.
 
Today, communities increase in about thirty countries of the five continents country. The deep-rooted movement in the Catholic Church regroups nevertheless, in several regions, Christians of different confessions. These ecumenical communities testify that the weak and handicapped person can become seed of unity, not only in the society and in the Church, but also between the churches.

Resources
An Action
A community Faith and Light, usually regrouping about thirty members, meet regularly for:
- a time of meeting and exchange: every meeting includes a time to meet again, to speak together, to listen to one another mutually. The main thing is to weave some     personal relations where one discovers sufferings and gifts of the other, where one learns to know him by his name. Sometimes, the sharing is made by the talking, sometimes by the common activities. By the friendship made of tenderness and fidelity, one becomes to the other sign of God's love.
- a time of feast: of friendship springs the joy. Meetings are marked by moments of rejoicing where one sings, where one dances, where one shares the same meal...
- a time of prayer: the human meeting finds its outcome in the prayer and in the eucharistic celebration, the communion with God and with our brothers.

The love is source of creativeness. According to the inspiration of God and the needs, Faith and Light can be brought to take other initiatives: times of welcome and animation during the day, vacation camps, meetings between communities,  pilgrimages, days of formation, retirements, deepening weekends...
 
A community is enlivened by a team of four to seven responsible persons (parents, friends, priest...). The communities, connected the one to the other by ties of friendship, by the regional, national, international meetings, by a charter and a constitution, look to be integrated in the activities of the society (and of the church in particular of the parish). That the communities Faith and Light permit you to find and to bring to others the necessary support in the daily life! That the Holy Spirit give you his strength and his peace! That Mary maintain your hearts turned towards the Savior in the hope!
Jean Paul II (to the pilgrims Faith and Light at Easter 1981)