Without the word, my life is unthinkable. A good day is a day with a good conversation, a good lecture given or heard, a good book read, or a good article written. Most of my joys and pains are connected with words. L'ARche, however, is built not on words, but on the body. Feeding, cleaning, touching, holding - this is what builds the community.
Words are secondary.
Most handicapped people have few words to speak, and many do not speak at all. It is the language of the body that counts most of all. The Word became flesh. That is the center of the Christian message. Before the Incarnation, the relationship between body and word was unclear.