"Am I a part of the cure? Or am I part of the disease?"

In the song "Clocks" the band Coldplay asks the question,

Am I part of the cure? Or am I part of the disease?

These are truly relevant questions for those of us in disability ministry to ask ourselves. The social consequences of disability are brutal. They are pervasive. We may be unaware of them unless we experience something like a disability that causes society to devalue us. Parents will have a child with a disability and suddenly experience what I call in my book Meowoof "the grumble" and wonder why they had never experienced or heard of it before. It was always there, even in they themselves. But they were unaware.

As an aspect of disability ministry we must become aware of these things. We must also be aware of the the way the traditions of our churches can also contribute to social devaluation.

I have seen ministries to persons with disabilities which are truly part of the the disease.
The disease of the grumble.
The disease of devaluation.
The disease of unwillingness to change.
The disease totally misunderstanding who persons with disabilities are, their value, their giftedness, how we as the Body of Christ desperately need then. And how we desperately need them with us, next to us physically and socially.

If I participate in the grumble, I am part of the disease.
If I participate in any form of devaluation, like age inappropriateness, I am part of the disease.
If I am unwilling to change church traditions in order that devalued people can have access,, then I am part of the disease.
If I refuse to change personally so that people with disabilities can have friendships, can make demands on me to love them, then I am part of the disease.
If I refuse to find and provide opportunities for the expression of gifts of severely disabled people, then I am part of the disease.
If I segregate people, I am part of the disease.

I could go on and on with this.

Ministry leader, reflect on what you are doing! I have often done this and saw how I have been a part of the disease I claim to be curing.

McNair

Preventing speech about the beauty of people with Down Syndrome

A dear friend from Australia, among others, made me aware of a video apparently banned on French TV. It was actually just a TV commercial. It illustrates the suppression of speech that we see growing in a variety of places around the world. But in this case, it has to do with keeping people from seeing the the beautiful lives of persons with Down Syndrome.

Repression of speech has blossomed in the US in universities where the notion of an exchange of ideas is desperately being put down by liberal elitists. Either they are blind to the complete hypocrisy of what they are doing, or more likely, they know exactly what they are doing. For example at conferences which I have attended, liberal faculty will actually say there is no tenable alternative perspective to the one they are purveying. Clearly if they are university trained, you would think they would obviously know better than to say something so stupid. However, it could be that BECAUSE they are university trained that they are so unreflectively and mind numbingly foolish.

Independent of your political persuasions, you must admit that we see this reaction in the response to the election of the US president. If you voted for the winner, many opponents consider you deplorable, among other vindictives because clearly there is only one perspective on any issue and that is the one that held by detractors. So the detractor's response is to tantrum because they have lost the ability to understand that there are a variety of ideas and independent of how hard they believe something, not everyone agrees with them. I am not always right. But when people indicate that they do not agree with me, I throw myself on the floor and flail around like a child.

If I am an adult, however, with as open a mind as I claim to have, I am willing to allow others to hold and express their perspectives. But others unfortunately will not allow me to hold or express my perspectives on these issues.

So as in the commercial mentioned above, go ahead liberal, pro abortion supporters in France. Publicize your desire to terminate the lives of anyone for that matter, who is different from you and advocate for not causing remorse in anyone who you convinced to do something that was evil. Go ahead. That is your right. But then allow me to show you what you have done through the evil that you have propagated ONLY by showing the beauty of the lives you have NOT successfully terminated.  In your rabid foolishness you have destroyed something beautiful. I will not curse you. I will only attempt to direct your eyes to the beauty that might have been there but isn't because of your misguided actions. But even THAT is not permitted.

Truth is not what these people are after. 

They are only interested in forcing an arguably immoral position that they cling to like a drug addict to his needle.

McNair

Link to video