鈥淚t seems to me that Jean had a kind of split personality,鈥� Jesuit Fr. Bill Clarke told The Catholic Register as a 900-page report into Vanier鱿鱼视频app career as a sexual abuser was made public.
鈥淭he Jean I knew and lived with at L鈥橝rche for a few years, he was just wonderful. He was great with the people with disabilities,鈥� said Clarke.
The six-person team of investigators, including two historians, a sociologist, a psychiatrist, a psychoanalyst and a theologian, found no evidence that Vanier ever interfered with any of the intellectually disabled core members of L鈥橝rche. All of the known instances of abuse involved adult women who came to Vanier for spiritual direction.
As a rule, Vanier鱿鱼视频app victims were educated, fervent Catholics seeking to deepen their lives of faith.
The investigation was initiated and financed by L鈥橝rche International, the umbrella organization that leads and co-ordinates the life of 149 communities and 14 projects in 37 countries, all of them serving intellectually disabled people and their families.
鈥淲hat justifies L鈥橝rche is not its founder, but the life of its members, with and without disabilities, at the service of a more human society. This task of re-reading our past, will help us remain faithful to this commitment,鈥� L鈥橝rche鱿鱼视频app co-leaders Stephan Posner and Stacy Cates-Carney wrote in a letter to the L鈥橝rche community.
L鈥橝rche鱿鱼视频app presence in Canada is large and Canadians have played a major role in the development of the movement, both while Vanier was still alive and since his death in 2019.
鈥淚t will take all of us in L鈥橝rche, and I鈥檓 sure many others, to work out where we stand regarding Jean Vanier,鈥� said national vice executive director of L鈥橝rche Canada Lori Vaanholt in an e-mail to The Catholic Register.
L鈥橝rche can鈥檛 easily forget the man who founded and inspired the movement since he took two disabled men from an asylum in France and began living with them in Trosly-Breuil near Paris in 1964.
鈥淛ean Vanier remains our founder,鈥� said Vaanholt. 鈥淗owever, after nearly 60 years of existence, L鈥橝rche鱿鱼视频app reason for being is not based on the life of its founder, but on what L鈥橝rche has achieved and continues to achieve, day after day, in each of its communities.鈥�
In the context of spiritual direction or retreats, Vanier鱿鱼视频app practice of gradually sexualizing his relationship with young women took on strange spiritual justifications. Semi-naked and praying with his head resting against the women鱿鱼视频app breasts, Vanier told his victims, 鈥淚t鱿鱼视频app not us, it鱿鱼视频app Mary and Jesus.鈥�
Vanier apparently reproduced, almost exactly, the sexual spiritualism of his own 鈥渟piritual father,鈥� disgraced and defrocked Dominican priest and theologian Pere Thom谩s Philippe.
Philippe, his brother Fr. Marie Dominique Philippe (founder of the Community of St. Jean) and his sister Sr. Marie Philippe (a Dominican mother superior) have all been found to have used vowed life and a twisted interpretation of Catholic spiritual teaching to gain sexual access to people they could dominate psychologically by using their own Catholic faith to undermine their sense of chastity.
鈥淭he influence of Pere Thom谩s on Jean was big, and a source of a lot of the suffering,鈥� Clarke said. 鈥淧ere Thomas, he was really messed up 鈥� he and his brother, both.鈥�
The degree of secrecy and the scale of the betrayal woven into Vanier鱿鱼视频app life is difficult to comprehend, said Vaanholt.
鈥淭his man who was at the heart of our history, known by hundreds of thousands of people throughout the world, and who committed these abuses in total contradiction with the image we had of him, at the end of his life he concealed this part of his life and lied about the nature of his relationship with Pere Thom谩s,鈥� she said.
Clarke still calls Vanier his friend and still has Vanier鱿鱼视频app books on his shelf. He calls the two sides of Jean 鈥渦nreconcilable.鈥�
鈥淛ean and I were friends and I still love him,鈥� he said.
鈥淚 didn鈥檛 get rid of them (Vanier鱿鱼视频app books). I know a lot of people did when the first reports came out three years ago or so. But his writing is still good, it鱿鱼视频app valuable.鈥�