Vision

Changing the way people with intellectual and developmental disabilities live and connect in community.

Values

• Treating people with dignity and respect: We value every person and celebrate who they are, actively embracing them in our communities. Fully present together, listening, and experiencing harmony within diversity.

• Friendliness and welcome: We build friendships together, in joyful and grateful spirit. We offer meaningful invitation and welcome to newcomers and to each other daily

• Empathy: We are committed to understanding and sharing feelings of one another. We prioritize the qualities of compassion, caring, and kindness to nurture empathy. The quality of the shared life we build together is the full expression of empathy.

• Integrity: We seek to be authentic and honest, trustworthy, and open. We are willing to be both vulnerable and courageous.

• Commitment to community building: We share life together rather than merely work together. And share responsibility for the life and wellbeing of the community as a whole. We practice forgiveness and celebration, creating spaces of belonging. We nurture shared spirituality expressed through community traditions such as gratitude prayer at dinnertime.

• Openness to reflection, learning, and growth: We nurture the gifts of each person, creating a learning culture together.

• Commitment to the Vision and Mission of L’Arche: We actively engage in all dimensions of the Mission and practice both personally and communally. We demonstrate our commitment as people with and without intellectual/developmental disabilities (I/DD) sharing in life together through engaging in our local neighborhoods and the wider world.

• Sharing with those more vulnerable: We recognize that many in our community and most in our world do not have the resources for meeting their basic needs. We demonstrate our commitment to sharing when we explore ways to include those most vulnerable in our outreach efforts to create a more just and caring society.

Mission

We are people, with and without intellectual disabilities, sharing life in communities, belonging to an International Federation. Mutual relationships and trust in God are at the heart of our journey together. We celebrate the unique value of every person and recognize our need for one another.

The Mission of L’Arche Wavecrest is twofold:

(1) To create vital, healthy, spiritually rich homes for individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD)

(2) To build relationships that integrate the lives and gifts of individuals with IDD, inclusive of all sectors within the wider community. Such integration infuses civil society with true human values.

Our founding home, Abraham House is in Orange, California. Four Core Members with IDD live in this California state licensed Adult Residential Facility (ARF), referred to as Abraham House. Together, they share life with people without IDD, Direct Service Professionals (DSPs) known as “Assistants” in L’Arche lingo. The large backyard and pool allow for fun Community Gatherings (an open house more or less) where everyone is welcome!

We opened Haven House in Tustin in 2019. Four Core Members with IDD also live in this home–a California state licensed ARF. And DSPs/Assistants share life with the Core Members in Haven House as well as Abraham House, where combined celebrations and activities often occur.

Community Gatherings held at either home or in other settings with community partners, are held monthly. Prayer Nights are also being hosted in person once again at Abraham House or Haven House.

The video “Belonging” is from L’Arche USA, but any one of our Core Members could attest to what other Core Members from other communities might say.

Message from Amy Blackburn, Executive Director at L’Arche Wavecrest:

“Everything I do in this work is for our Core Members and Wavecrest personnel. My goal is to continue to improve and develop our services and programs so that Core Members experience the most enhanced quality of life; and to increase capacity of our organization so that our employees can learn, grow, and advance in their career goals as well as being better human beings. Fundraising, grants, and donations are key to Wavecrest growing to be a known model of programs and services which integrate people with and without intellectual disabilities.”