New Roles

This was our first week in our new roles at L’Arche. Sunday, April 18^th we were both present in the Ember. Lucy had her second observation of Jillian’s routine and then accompanied Jillian and her father to their church. The message posed an interesting question: if you were accused in a court of law of being a Christian would you be convicted? The pastor said ways to convict would be faith, love and works. It was an interesting and thought provoking message. In the afternoon, the two of us along with Jillian made cards for May, who was in a play about stereotypes and the evening was filled with a spring-cleaning of Thomas’ room!

On Monday, we had our weekly team meeting and then ventured down to buy Micah some garden boots! He was quite excited to get some boots to stomp around in the horse manure out at the allotment.

Tuesday, sadly, Micah did not get to go to Edinburgh. He was planning to go to Scotland for a social enterprise conference, but due to the volcanic ash the flights were cancelled. Instead, Micah lead the team formation at the allotment and we all pulled weeds for about an hour before heading back to get a cup of tea and warm up! In the afternoon, Micah went to work on the business plan for Root Soup with Maria and Lucy went to work in the office on volunteer coordination with Faythe.

Wednesday was Lucy’s first day helping Jill with her routine alone. Jill responded better to Lucy helping than expected, but was pretty insecure that she was going to be left alone. Jill will just need to get used to Lucy helping her and then it will all go more smoothly! After the core members were off to college and the center, we had our second round of induction (orientation) with Scott. Then Micah had his first UK driving experience. He will have a couple more and then he will be an official driver for L’Arche! In the afternoon Lucy was in the Ember and Micah was pulling weeds in the back of the Ark. The backyard of the Ark has been left unkempt for some time and is need to some TLC. We plan to add some raised beds for tomatoes, cucumbers, zucchini, and anything else that isn’t wind resistant that won’t grow at the allotment. We are planning to rip out a couple dead bushes to plant some berry bushes! Soon we will have a backyard worth spending time and having BBQs in (hopefully!).

On Thursday Lucy was in the office with Faythe. The days was filled with emailing potential volunteers to set up phone interviews, say we either have or don’t have a spot for them, or tell them we are reviewing their application! Then Faythe gave me a rundown on the visa process from the “sponsorship” side. The visa process is the part of the job that is most overwhelming. There are so many things to make sure to do exactly right and steps to it! Luckily there are plenty of people in other L’Arches in the UK that can be called to ask questions when Lucy goes through it for the first time! It was quite interesting to learn that L’Arche Ireland does not accept any applications from people from “third world” countries because of their “tendency to not fulfill their time” while L’Arche UK does not have a policy there is increased paperwork to the visa application for an applicant from a “third world country.” So, L’Arche Belfast has not made a policy and has left it in the gray saying that they would prefer the person to have experience in another L’Arche before coming to L’Arche Belfast. It was just interesting to learn how this is distinguished in a “worldwide community” even if politically it makes sense. Micah filled his day with gardening. Scott and Micah went to Maria’s house and created two vegetable plots for her. Afterwards, Scott and Micah went up to mow the allotment and check on the progress of the fruits and veggies. Micah has enjoyed beginning to learn all about organic gardening and it will be exciting when 20 raised beds and the fruit bushes and trees begin to produce.

Friday was a rest day for both Lucy and Micah. We had everyone from the Ember over to the Ark for dinner. Larry, Micah and Lucy made taco salad for dinner! It was a good evening in the Ark!

Saturday we were present in the Ember. Lucy accompanied Jill to Michel’s, her weekly Saturday outing to a local vegetable shop. Then everyone from the Ember went out to lunch at a café down the road. The afternoon was filled with babysitting for Scott and Megan’s kids and then it was time for the traditional Saturday meal of fish and chips. After dinner, Maria and Thomas returned from a L’Arche meeting in Dublin and we enjoyed an evening of chatting around the table with tea and biscuits. We pondered such questions as “What animal is your soul?” and “Is that person more like a cat or a dog?” It was good times around the Ember table!

Today, Micah continued his training for the team marathon. Other than that we were travel agents. We started working on a sketch of an itinerary for Micah’s parents visit as well as planned our trip to Amsterdam in a few weeks to see Ana sing with the Hesston Chorale. It was an exciting day of planning!

The past week has really flown by with a lot of new experiences as we have gotten into our new roles. We would ask for prayers are we are continuing to learn these new positions and finding the balance between life in the office, Ember, garden and Ark. Lucy has been sick with a nagging cold for a couple weeks and would really appreciate prayers. Thanks for all your ongoing support!