Loving your neighbor

"The love which Paul describes goes out to our brethren and to our fellow men. "Love suffers long." This first stroke of the brush shows that we are to be given a portrait of Christian love as it finds itself amid the sins, evils, and trials of a fallen world...
Paul does not describe love to us in the role of performing great, wonderful, and astounding deeds; he prefers to show us how the inner heart of love looks when it is placed among sinful men and weak and needy brethren. He does not picture love in ideal surroundings of friendship and affection where each individual embraces and kisses the other but in the hard surroundings of a bad world and a faulty church where distressing influences bring out the positive power and value of love."
(Lenski, R.C.H. (1961). The interpretation of I and II Corinthians. Minneapolis, MN: Augsburg Publishing House, p. 554-555).

This commentary is in relation to 1 Corinthians 13:4. To begin by saying "love suffers long" (KJV) leads to the implications made by Lenski above. If, as he says, love were in ideal surroundings, it would not suffer. However, it does suffer because of the difficult surroundings love finds itself in. So love has to be patient, love has to resist being unkind, boastful or rude. The environment would have the tendency to push it in that direction, however, it must resist. These resistances to reaction in and to a hostile environment are the successes of love. We face these challenges to love in the "sins, evils, and trials of a fallen world" as well as a "bad world and a faulty church."

Obviously the church is not perfect and will never be until redeemed by Christ himself as his bride. But we expect more from it. Perhaps we expect faulty love, but we still expect love nonetheless. But faulty love can be improved upon if we desire to improve upon it. When aspects of our faulty love are pointed out to us, one would hope our response would be more along the lines of "Thank you and I will try to respond better" than a response of "Whatever?" Sometimes the faulty love we evidence is most clearly demonstrated in our response to devalued people who have always experienced faulty relationships, faulty caring and faulty love expressed toward them as a matter of course. It is no wonder they often will not trust us when we try to be more loving toward them.

I see the lack of love in myself toward others. Anger will sometimes trump love. Comfort will sometimes trump love. Impatience will sometimes trump love. It isn't that I have refused to do something spectacular from a love perspective. No, it is more that I have refused to love more mundanely through phone calls, spending of time, being patient. My relationships with people take place in a "bad world and a faulty church." Will I contribute to continuing the bad world? Will I be the evidence that the love of the church is faulty? It seems to start with me.

McNair

Presence of persons with disabilities in the Christian community

"If nothing else, people with disabilities can at least have presence."
I have written quite a bit about presence in this blog. People will say this kind of thing about others that they haven't taken the time to know, to see their gifting. There is a laziness about this statement.  But there are those with very severe disabilities for whom people having the best intentions will say the above. We say these kinds of things often because we are unable to figure out a person with a very severe disability's gifting. It is as if they are reduced to presence. Now I'm not saying that all a person has is presence, but if you think about it, it alone could be a pretty incredible thing. Particularly when you consider that it is not facilitated for them. Yes as a starting point, but perhaps more broadly, the most important thing for someone with a disability, or anyone for that matter in a church community, is presence. Presence changes things. Presence reveals things (as in the Good Samaritan). What is the thing that people with disabilities need more than anything else? Presence. What does the church need from persons with disabilities more than anything else? Their presence. Presence implies being among, being seen, being a part of something. Presence can also make demands. Perhaps in part that is why the presence of persons with disabilities is often not facilitated and at times rejected. Presence can be powerful and make demands.

But what is it that is rejected when presence is denied? Arguably it is an aspect of God's own image. People rejectors are God rejectors. James 2:1 says, "My dear brothers and sisters, how can you claim to have faith in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ if you favor some people over others?" (NLT). Apparently, there is a connection there. Presence of persons with disabilities is minimally a starting point because of where it leads.
It leads to excluded people having their gifts discovered and expressed.
It leads to changes in traditions which we have come to syncretise as part of faith or theology.
It leads to changes in understanding the breadth who human beings are.
In some cases, it leads to worship and other aspects of church attendance becoming more service oriented.
It leads to caring and advocacy which can be demanding.
We come to realize that not everyone has the same experiences in life that we do.

I have often said that in my life, God's in his sovereignty has allowed me to have health, a good job, and nice place to live, a beautiful family and so on and so on. I am incredibly grateful for these blessings. But when people struggling with muscular dsytrophy, or mental illness come into my world, I learn that the way God's sovereignty is expressed in the lives of others is different from my own and demands from me  a response. Their lives are they way they are for them, but they are also the way they are for me as a fellow body member. Their presence opens my eyes to human variety and what should be the logical Christian response, human interaction. I see God being real to them in their life circumstances as he is to me in mine. They also reveal aspects of the character of God that I will not see if they are not present. So presence is not a minimal thing. It is foundational to so many things related to Christian faith for all.

McNair

A response to suffering

Maybe part of life is joining clubs you never wished to be a part of, 

then walking others through them too.

That is a quote from someone I once knew in response to suffering they were facing. Such a response is so incredibly difficult, but also so very incredibly wise. It helps a bit when we can get the slightest glimpse of purpose in our suffering. It is only with faith in God as a backdrop to your life that you are able to say things like the above. God brings purpose to life. Without God, there is no purpose and suffering is all pain and completely meaningless. The above is the juxtaposition of tears and trust. Trust tempers the tears. It is a juxtaposition of strength and sadness. Sadness remains, perhaps forever. But strength is provided to face the sadness. I am so grateful that this friend had the Lord Jesus in their life who gave the courage to even say the above. May God also continue to give them the strength to live it, which is the more difficult part.

The above statement is a prayer. A paraphrase might be, "Lord, by faith and in obedience I join this club of suffering, but please don't let it be without meaning. Will you use the strength that you gave me to make this statement, to also live this statement."

I am reminded of the passage from 2 Corinthians 12:9 when the Lord says to Paul, " My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." Weakness can lead to statements like the above. But God's grace also brings the incredible power evidenced by such statements. It is his grace promised and then provided that shows a way through the things which debilitate us. I don't know how people face suffering without the Lord. Paul then responds by saying he will boast in his weakness. This is a much further step to take. It is saying that it is God who takes me through my weakness. I did not take myself through. God gave me strength. I did not have the strength within myself.  But please do not misunderstand. This is very hard. My suffering surrounds me but as I weep, I choose trust in God. I pray that I will choose trust in God. My strength fails me, but in complete weakness I choose to trust in God. With the little strength that is my own, supported by God's spirit, I pray to trust in God. I respond to waves of sadness that threaten to drown me, with waves of trust in my Lord.

I would say to anyone who might read this and is suffering, in a courageous act of your will call on God to show you his grace. Ask him to keep to his promise to provide grace. Ask him to walk through whatever you are facing with you. Perhaps begin with the simple prayer, "Help me!"

McNair

Talking to your church leaders about starting disability ministry

In the great book, Lead like Jesus by Ken Blanchard and Phil Hodges, there are many great insights. One struck me as I was rereading it recently. On page 191-192 they state,

"Whenever we are asked to do something different in life, the change agent - whether a manager, a spouse, a parent, a sibling, a colleague, or a friend - usually starts off by attempting to convince you of all the benefits of the change you are being  asked to make. Yet it's been found that the benefits - the impact and the "why" of change - is the fourth-ranked concern people have during change. People are first interested in information concerns. "Tell me what you have in mind. What is needed? What is wrong with the way things are now?" When you have information concerns, you don't want to be sold on the change; you simply want to understand it. Next, people are interested in personal concerns. "How will doing this affect me? Do I have what it takes to integrate the suggested change in my life?" Here the focus is on the details involved in making the change a reality. Third, people have implementation concerns. "What do I do first, second, third, etc.?"

This is an important set of observations for us who who are endeavoring to facilitate change within the church. I immediately saw myself as jumping down to the number 4 concern about the impact in my interactions and I think that I would agree with the authors that that is a mistake. Just to help to see the progression, let me list the questions in order.

1-Tell me what you have in mind.
  What is needed?
  What is wrong with the way things are now?
2-How will doing this affect me?
  Do I have what it takes to integrate the suggested change in my life?
3-What do I do first, second, third, etc.?
4-Here are the benefits of the change that I am asking you to make.

Think through this progression before the next time you are attempting to influence someone about the benefits of inclusive ministry.

McNair

Definition of disability ministry

I wanted to post the following mostly to receive input from anyone who might be interested. Here is a first draft of a definition of disability ministry.

Disability Ministry

Disability ministry is the label given to efforts to address disability (definition provided in a separate document), in the Christian community.

Ministries first endeavor to create greater confidence in Jesus Christ among persons affected by disability (definition provided in a separate document) by discipling Christian individuals…

1). So that they understand what the Bible says. For those with intellectual impairments, that they comprehend at their level of understanding.

2). By teaching and modeling Christian behavior so that people can produce Christian behavior (including worship, prayer, evangelism, service, and discipleship).

3). By facilitating people’s understanding and expression of their individual gifting in loving service.

Disability ministry also works to facilitate the discipling of Christian environments…

4). To begin with repentance, recognizing that historically the Church has not always loved its neighbors with impairments.

5). To see all people as who the Bible teaches they are.

6). To actively facilitate the expression of everyone’s gifting.

7). To assume persons with disabilities are to be fully included in all Church social environments and then to work towards that inclusion.

And finally…

8). To advocate for cultural change within the Church to reflect all 8 of the above.

Thank you for any input you might provide!

McNair

Meowoof

I have been receiving much positive feedback on my juvenile fiction novel called Meowoof. It would be great for young people or adults interested in exploring what it is to be different in some way. Here is what I wrote about it last November when it was about to be launched. Please consider picking up a copy! 

Meowoof is a new book from Jeff McNair. It would be great to give to a young person who feels different in some way, someone with a disability, or parents of a child with a disability. It is juvenile fiction so it is easy reading and fun. But there are very deep ideas behind the engaging story. Great also for a discussion group interested in discussing differences in people.

Here is the description that goes with the book.

Meowoof invites you into a world of dogs! Of course it is filled with licking, sniffing, biting and chasing. It is no doubt a fun and amusing place to visit. But life is not without its challenges. 
Barney, a beagle, and his mate Inky, a dachshund are just a young couple looking to start a family and live a typical life. But there is something unusual about one of their pups. He is like no pup they or any other dogs have ever seen before. Skip and Rosie, friends of the family do their best to support them as does His Howliness, the leader of the Moon Howlers, but they are up against attitudes deeply held by doggy society. Barney and Inky find out how those around can change when someone is not like everyone else. Those who understand the experience of being different will fearfully whisper about how dogs are taken over by the Grumble, an evil living inside of everyone. How does one battle against something everyone has inside of them? Dogs like Skip and His Howliness refuse to be put off by differences in others and will bear their teeth and fight the Grumble. But the Grumble is not that easily defeated. 
What is it to be different? What happens to you and those around you when you are not like everyone else? You are different. In a truly unique way, Meowoof begins a story about those who are different and what their lives are like.  

• If you are a little different you will see yourself in this story. 
• If you love someone who is different, you will more fully understand your experience. 
• And, if you struggle with those who are different, perhaps you will begin to understand why.

McNair

Treating persons with intellectual disabilities in an age appropriate manner

Last year, I spoke at a conference attended by persons interested in theology, disability and disability ministry. Many were arguably disability ministry leaders. The main topic of my presentation was related to age appropriateness in ministry approaches to persons with intellectual disabilities.  I have to admit I was surprised when I received a lot of push back from the group about treating adults with intellectual disabilities as adults. You see, when you treat adults as children, this reveals more about who you are then about who they are. So these leaders reflected more about who they were which was what was somewhat shocking to me. Like any form of discrimination, actions can reveal discrimination. You have a characteristic which in most ways should be considered irrelevant to my interactions with you. I, however, see your characteristic as something which I feel I should elevate to a level which I feel allows me to act toward you in ways I would never act towards others.

Without naming specific programs, there are those who attempt to celebrate the lives of persons with intellectual disabilities by treating them in age inappropriate, demeaning ways. Imagine any group who has been discriminated against in some way by the larger society. The larger society then recognizes that those individuals have experienced discrimination. So in "repentance" they celebrate you in the same ways in which you have historically experienced being demeaned. This happens with age inappropriateness. Society has treated adults with intellectual disabilities as children. But when it comes time to try to celebrate them, they actually denigrate them by treating them as children. Once again that reveals who they are, not who those with disabilities are.

Now I recognize that people will do these things with the best intentions. Segregated ministries are developed similarly, with the best intentions. However, intentions when leading to flawed programs or activities do not justify the flawed programs or activities. I would like to care about your intentions, however, I am more interested in what you actually do. In the same way that if you segregate people with the best intentions and are dead wrong, if you treat adults as children because they have an intellectual disability you are wrong. If you want to read more on age appropriateness, see these past blog entries.

My wife Kathi and I have facilitated ministry at local churches for 40 years. In the past 27 years of our group called the Light and Power Company, we have made every effort to ensure that adults are treated as adults. I remember one visitor to our program commented, "Your program is different in that you treat them as if they were your peers." Well Lord willing, we do not treat them AS IF they were our peers, we treat them as our peers because they are our peers. They are adults and therefore should be treated as adults. Once again, if I do not treat adults as adults, it reveals things, negative things, about me. Such treatment is not reflective of anything about the individual with intellectual disability.

I am working on an article at the moment on age appropriateness. As ideas develop I will share more here.

McNair

Prayer by persons with severe disabilities

It might seem obvious, but a critical aspect of ministry is to teach people to pray. In assisting adults with intellectual disabilities to grow in their faith, one thing we have desired to do is to teach them to pray. Too often the prayers we hear from people are full of words, full of directions, as if God isn't really sure what to do so he needs us to tell him what to do.

I have addressed this a bit in a past post called Help Me.

The class my wife and I facilitate at our church is called the Light and Power Company. At times, we have hosted an all church prayer meeting. The meeting are sparsely attended by around 30 people, but they are always a great time.

In preparing for the event, it occurred to me that prayer would be a great leveler of persons within the church. As stated above, God is not honored by many words repeated. Our prayers are equal. For me to go on and on about the surgeon's training and hands and whatever else comes to mind does not make my prayer any more effective than that of someone who simply says, "Help Sally get better" or even more simply, “Help Sally.” At the same time, however, who knows if the faith of persons with intellectual disability may cause a qualitative difference between my and their prayers.

Perhaps consider instituting a prayer session sponsored by the persons with disabilities in your church. It gives teeth to the lesson that we really are all equal at the foot of the cross. It also should raise the esteem of persons with disabilities in the eyes of other members of the church. There are people who will literally not be prayed for if not for the prayers of persons with disabilities. We had a class member who would ask every week that his bus driver and his teacher would be prayed for. These were two very important people in his life. So we prayed for those people every week. We have no idea the ramification of those prayers, however, one has to believe that they made a difference.

Teaching persons with severe intellectual disabilities to pray is very powerful. I have often been told by someone, someone with a severe intellectual disability, that I was prayed for by them. One friend would greet me every week by saying, "I pray for you Jeff! I nice to you Jeff!" I would always express my appreciation for his prayers. He delighted in praying for me and I delighted in being prayed for by him.

In my work, I do a lot of international travel. I used to ask our class members as a group to pray for me in just a general announcement. One day a woman named Amber came up to me and said, “I pray for you Jeff.” So I sat down before her as she placed her hands on my head. She prayed, “Help Jeff. Help Jeff” several times. She then closed by saying, “I’m trying to be a good girl.” What an incredible prayer. Since that time I always seek her out to ask her to pray for me when I travel. When I am facing challenging times in my life I will also ask her to pray. Sometimes her prayers will be different. One time she actually wept as she prayed for me. Another time she suddenly said, “Devil get away from him!” That was a little frightening. I relish her prayers. At times now, now that she knows she has "permission" she will just approach me and say once again, "I pray for you Jeff." I stop what I am doing, hold her hands or she puts her hands on my head or shoulder and I submit to her ministry of praying for me.

A couple of last comments about prayer. First, when I humble myself before Amber, I honor her and provide her the opportunity to express her gifting by praying for me. Her prayers for me are real to me and valued by me. But I also demonstrate her gifting to those who are observing. Forgive me, but at times I deliberately ask her to pray for me in locations where there are other people around. I want them to see how I value her prayer. Perhaps it will cause them to reflect on who she is in God’s sight as well.

McNair

More on the Good Samaritan: "Who is not my neighbor?"

If you are a regular reader of this blog, you know that I find the story of the Good Samaritan very very rich. Particularly, I find it rich as it relates to ministries that include persons with disabilities. Here is a link to past posts where I have discussed or mentioned the Good Samaritan passage.

But I love to learn new things about any passage which has become familiar to me. This happened recently in a conversation with a colleague, Dr. Chris Morgan. Chris is the brilliant Dean of Christian Studies at CBU. Hopefully I am representing Chris' comments correctly, but he indicated something very interesting to me about the story. Chris said that the question asked of Jesus by the Lawyer was not really to identify who his neighbor is, but rather who his neighbor is not. That may have been obvious to you but it sure wasn't to me, at least not in that way. It also says he was trying to justify himself. Why would he be trying to justify himself? He wanted to see if his non-neighbors were the right group. The Lawyer's assumption obviously implies that in his mind, that although there were people who were his neighbor, there were people who were not his neighbor. So he just wanted to see if those who he didn't see as his neighbor were the same ones that Jesus wouldn't see as his neighbor. I hope I got Chris' point correct.

As I thought through his observation, it also seemed to me, that Jesus was then providing an illustration for the Lawyer of what it looks like if you don't choose an individual or a group of people as your neighbor. Both the Priest and Levite did not see the man who was beaten and left half dead as their neighbor, probably for a variety of reasons. In contrast, the Samaritan saw people of a different ethnic group, who were considered "enemies", who were in great need, who potentially put him in danger, who could do nothing for themselves, as his neighbor. This is much more in line with the Leviticus 19 passage which the story references (Leviticus 19, especially verses 9-18). Jesus asks the Lawyer, "Which of these three, do you think, proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell among the robbers?" The Lawyer responded "The one who showed him mercy" possibly responding that way because he didn't even want to use the word Samaritan. He was still trying to separate people into the two groups of

1- My Neighbor

2- Not my Neighbor

I think we can sometimes do that in reference to persons with disabilities. We ask the question, "Who is my neighbor?" and then answer it "Those with disabilities are not my neighbor" justifying (like the lawyer) our lack of concern for persons with the characteristic called impairment. I have actually heard people say that people with disabilities are not a priority for ministry, ie. they are not my neighbor. So this is a real distinction which may at times continue today.

But from a disability perspective, Jesus totally blows up the restrictive notion of who our neighbor is. He describes the man beaten and left half-dead as our neighbor. Think that through a minute. He was a man who could do absolutely nothing for himself. He is not described as doing anything at all for himself, not even calling out. So once again the answer from a disability perspective to, "And who is my neighbor?" Jesus describes someone with very severe disabilities at the moment and perhaps into the future.

McNair

"If one part suffers, all the parts suffer with it"

1 Corinthians 12 talks about the Body of Christ as a metaphor for the church. Members are represented as hands, eyes and feet in order to illustrate our connectedness. We are a part of each other, whether we realize it or not, in the same way that your hand, eye or foot is a part of your body.

I have often remarked in reference to verse 28, "If one part suffers, all the parts suffer with it", no we don't. I say that because I know of persons with disabilities who have been seemingly cut off or excluded from the Body of Christ, the church, and we don't seem to be participating in their suffering. A colleague of mine, however, said to me that we are actually suffering, but we just don't realize it. As he shared that perspective with me, I immediately thought about leprosy where the sense of pain is lost. But as I think about it, it is more than that perhaps. How can I be suffering and not even know it?

Maybe it's because I have lived my life in a suffering state for so long, I don't know what it is not to be suffering in a particular way. Suffering in that manner becomes the norm for me. So for example, I have lived my life since age 5 wearing glasses. I have seen the world, looking through lenses for 55 years. I have on some level become used to the scratched, smudged experience of seeing the world. I don't realize my impaired vision from wearing glasses until I get new glasses. Then for a while I have the clear vision experience (although I still am living my life feeling like I am looking through a window rather than having an unobstructed view of the world). But after a while, I ultimately go back to the imperfect, scratched, smudged glasses experience. I get to the point where I don't know what it is like to not be that way. But in regards to this Bible passage, how might the body be suffering and know knowing it?

Maybe I am suffering from accepting living in a form of the Body of Christ where we don't love our neighbors. I could live in a beautiful, though demanding, social environment but I don't because I have become accustomed to the way the social environment has developed and found its way into the Church. Even though I may have an idea of what life might be like if I and the rest of the body loved our neighbor I have never fully experienced it. So I suffer though I don't know what it is I am missing.

Then, maybe I suffer from missing out on what the social environment might be if everyone was provided the opportunity to experience their gifting. We speak in the Christian faith of purpose in what God does. So in reference to disability we would say that God either causes or allows disability. However, if the purpose in the way people are, the giftedness in what they are as they are is not given opportunity for expression then I suffer from an incomplete expression of the sovereignty of God. It would be as if there were no musicians in the world because people with characteristics leading them to become musicians were excluded from us. I don't know what I am missing because a particular gifting set (potentially) is never expressed. Once again, we suffer from missing out on that set of gifts. We suffer from no music because we have never had music. If we had music and then had it taken away, then we would suffer from the beauty missed. But if we never had music, we are suffering from something we were intended to experience but have never experienced because of our exclusive choices.

We also suffer from living in disobedience. Of course we are all the victims of our sinful condition in myriad ways, most of which we probably have no idea about. But with each step with which we grow in obedience, we may find out how we have been suffering, what we have missed out on by living in our disobedience. We experience this personally but we also experience this corporately in a similar way. When we as a group make decisions that are sinful in nature, like excluding people or showing favoritism, we lose something. We suffer something, although we may not realize what it is.

So yes, I agree with my colleague. Whether we realize it or not, we do suffer in ways we were not intended to suffer. Perhaps our awareness of these things will cause us to remember the pain, re-experience the pain and move away from the behavior that causes the pain.

McNair

Are we loving or persecuting Jesus?

There is an interesting connection between what we do to people and what we do to Jesus. We have heard about ministry to devalued people is ministry to what has been called the "hidden Christ." Typically in this regard we think of the Matthew 25 passage which says in verse 40
"And the King will say, 'I tell you the truth, when you did it to one of the least of these my brothers and sisters, you were doing it to me!'"
Then in verse 45 it says,
"And he will answer, 'I tell you the truth, when you refused to help the least of these my brothers and sisters, you were refusing to help me.'"
It recently occurred to me that this sentiment is also stated elsewhere. In Acts 9, when Jesus appears to Paul on the road to Damascus, having persecuted Christians, and on his way to persecute more, verse 4 says,
"He fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to him, 'Saul! Saul! Why are you persecuting me?" "Who are you lord?" Saul asked.
And the voice replied, "I am Jesus, the one you are persecuting!"
I mentioned in an earlier post, the passage from James 2:1 which says,
"My dear brothers and sisters, how can you claim to have faith in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ if you favor some people over others?"
It is as if to say, when you favor one group over another, you love one group over another and Jesus is a part of both groups. So maybe by showing favoritism you are actually not loving him.

This favoritism is something we need to take to heart. It is not necessarily that some people are more valuable than others. However, it appears that the way we treat others is tantamount to the way we actually, not metaphorically, treat Jesus. When Saul is persecuting Christians, Jesus' question is not "Why are you persecuting my church?" or "Why are you persecuting my followers?" He asks why Saul is persecuting Jesus himself. When we help or don't help others, we are actually doing it or not doing it for Jesus himself. There is some kind of deep, spiritual connection between the Lord and his followers that perhaps we don't fully understand. If we did understand it, we would make greater efforts to love and include our neighbors.

This is an important message we need to take to heart.
McNair

"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

Meowoof A new book by Jeff McNair

Meowoof is a new book from Jeff McNair. It would be great to give to a young person who feels different in some way, someone with a disability, or parents of a child with a disability. It is juvenile fiction so it is easy reading and fun. But there are very deep ideas behind the engaging story. Great also for a discussion group interested in discussing differences in people.
Here is the description that goes with the book.

Meowoof invites you into a world of dogs! Of course it is filled with licking, sniffing, biting and chasing. It is no doubt a fun and amusing place to visit. But life is not without its challenges. 


Barney, a beagle, and his mate Inky, a dachshund are just a young couple looking to start a family and live a typical life. But there is something unusual about one of their pups. He is like no pup they or any other dogs have ever seen before. Skip and Rosie, friends of the family do their best to support them as does His Howliness, the leader of the Moon Howlers, but they are up against attitudes deeply held by doggy society. Barney and Inky find out how those around can change when someone is not like everyone else. Those who understand the experience of being different will fearfully whisper about how dogs are taken over by the Grumble, an evil living inside of everyone. How does one battle against something everyone has inside of them? Dogs like Skip and His Howliness refuse to be put off by differences in others and will bear their teeth and fight the Grumble. But the Grumble is not that easily defeated. 


What is it to be different? What happens to you and those around you when you are not like everyone else? You are different. In a truly unique way, Meowoof begins a story about those who are different and what their lives are like.  

• If you are a little different you will see yourself in this story. 
• If you love someone who is different, you will more fully understand your experience. 
• And, if you struggle with those who are different, perhaps you will begin to understand why.

You can soon purchase Meowoof at Createspace by clicking on this line.
Or you can purchase it at Amazon.com by clicking on this line.

The Fear of Dissidents

One of my favorite books by Jean Vanier is Becoming Human. It is great book for anyone to read, not just those interested in disability or disability ministry. It is just as the title implies. It is a book about what it means to be human. When discussing the movement from exclusion to inclusion, Vanier has a section called "Fear of Dissidents." Let me provide a few quotes from this section.

There has always been a fear of the dissident, that is to say, of the one who seems to threaten the existing order. Those who fear the dissident are those who have a vested interest in the maintenance of that order; frequently, money and power, or the need to control others and to feel superior to them, are at the root of such interests (p 74).

The dissident can also challenge comfort and tradition. These are also power bases of a different sort which can be extremely difficult to change.

It is the nature of power to resist change... (p 74)

Change is clearly what we are after. Cultural change within the church. As I have mentioned in the past in this blog, Foucault, the philosopher, has stated that when you experience resistance, it implies that power is being expressed. Power can be expressed from bottom to top and from top to bottom. The resistance we sometimes feel in church leadership is clearly evidence of power attempting to be expressed from the bottom (see The Power of Those Who Seem Weaker article).

There is a deeper issue here, beyond the self-aggrandizement of the powerful. Leaders consider themselves as generally in the right. It is part of the paradigm we have  created: if you have succeeded in making your way to the top, then, by definition, by the law of natural selection, the values for which you stand have been authenticated (p 74).

The path to this leadership also did not include information that those with disabilities would desire to be present in the place the leader would be occupying, the local church. Because there was little to no training in this area, they are even more confident that they are right!

The only point to be made about all this is that it is important for leaders to listen to dissent and try to understand where it is coming from and what is true in it. If history teaches us nothing else, it is that power is borrowed...The principle at issue is the temporary nature of power, and the necessity of service and humility, the necessity of seeing what truth is being cried out in an act of protest ( p 75).

Oh that the Lord would give our leaders the wisdom to consider the dissident within their church. This is a bold statement, but I am positive that the desire we dissent from the church about, our desire to see devalued individuals included and valued is clearly the heart of God on this issue. We will not someday change from our dissenting position to a position of exclusion. But we should expect those in leadership to one day be among the dissenters.

McNair

Follow up on "How disability ministry could cause a change in human services."

I was thinking some more about the previous post on the impact disability ministry could have on human services.

The more that the church gets into the lives of people with disabilities, particularly those with more severe disabilities who live in residential settings, a variety of things could happen. The first thing is that churches could bump up against the perceived regulations covering these facilities, get frustrated with their lack of access and then give up. From my experience, that is something that could happen. Community members who endeavor to form relationships with people under the care of the state are not always welcomed with open arms. If one is allowed access, there is a feeling that you are up to something no good. There is also a worry about what you might see and to whom you might reveal what you have seen.
We had a situation once where there was something a bit disconcerting which occurred at a home. We didn't say anything to anyone, but somehow word got out about it and the agency which regulated the group home confronted them about what had happened. The owner of the group home accused us of telling the regulating agency about them and for the next almost year, residents were not permitted to go to church. As I relate in the Sherlock Holmes post the folks who lived in the home, once again they were people with quite severe intellectual disabilities were taught the phrase, "We are taking a break from church." So, you bump up against human services and they restrict church attendance of their residents.

So the second lesson is that we need to be serious about our desire to include people in relationships and then be persistent in attempting to facilitate the changes needed for residents to experience community integration. We are moving from being complicit in large scale social isolation to wanting to facilitate true community integration. No wonder our motives might be questioned. We have not been interested in those folks for a very long time and our change in interest can be misunderstood. So we need to be at homes, regularly, so that we can become known. As prove we are trustworthy, we can then move toward social integration via relationships with real, unpaid, community members.

Perhaps a third lesson if we are unsuccessful in our efforts is to work in some areas of human services ourselves. That is, perhaps we can develop homes people can live in. I know Christian parents who are desperately looking for Christian alternatives where there is the freedom to attend church. Perhaps we can facilitate vocational training and placement with businesses represented by the people who attend church. Perhaps we can facilitate opportunities for service for persons who are friendly and would make great companions but end up either at home all day or in adult day care settings where their lives might be wasted. In a future posting I will describe efforts I am pursuing to develop a certificate in Christian service for adults with disabilities. But rather than relying exclusively on government programs, perhaps we might develop better programs to both serve our community and reflect a Christian perspective.

There are more avenues which might be pursued. Let's keep thinking. Things as they are are not great. There is much room for innovative thinking and the offering of alternatives which could be significantly better for all.

McNair

How could disability ministry cause a change in human services?

As I have often mentioned in this blog, the current system of human services in America are based upon the wrong model of what disability is. Services are exclusively based on a medical model which basically sees disability as housed in an individual and interventions are geared to fix the person. Although this is quite a generalization, I would argue that it is basically true. What we need are also interventions by human services that work toward social environment change through an understanding which has become known as the social model of disability. In reality we need both and an emphasis on one or the other of these models takes us in a wrong direction.

The entrenched nature of human services causes one to feel it is virtually impossible to facilitate change. We appear (even professionals in human services) to be satisfied with the way services are designed, planned and delivered. I can tell you that parents are very often unsatisfied as are individuals who receive the services. But those of us in human services go on our merry way believing we are "God's gift" to those we serve. To not only change that mindset, let alone the services themselves, is once again virtually impossible. Human services' resistance to change is tantamount to moving a mountain. Might there be another way to facilitate changes?

But we could change the church.

Imagine the church got serious about its call to be the Body of Christ. What if we embraced social environment change in a social model kind of way? What if we developed relationships with devalued people rather than always relegating them to various programs? I truly wonder what the effect would be. State delivered services would become redundant at times because they were occurring naturally via relationships. As churches developed places where people could live, used the church network to facilitate employment, worked to maximize people's gifts so the didn't spend their days in adult day care or sheltered workshops, would this cause a change in the way human services are delivered?

I once went to Sacramento Ca. to lobby for a change in the regulations governing the way services to persons with developmental disabilities were provided and funded. In my 30 seconds of fame before the committee, I spoke of how the state should encourage faith groups to get into the lives of persons with disabilities. Not only would the supports be more reflective of a person's needs rather than a menu of services, they could be provided at a fraction of the cost. Now don't hear me wrong. I AM NOT SAYING THAT THE CHURCH SHOULD TAKE OVER ALL HUMAN SERVICES FOR PERSONS AFFECTED BY DISABILITY. However what I am saying, is that human services could be much more "surgical" in the ways they are delivered, just meeting needs in specific areas. If churches were encouraged by the state to be involved in the lives of devalued persons rather than being treated like a pariah because of draconian notions of church state separation, all would benefit. Persons with disabilities would develop relationships and feel caring. States could spend money on network development and addressing discrimination rather than segregating people from the community for the purpose of medical model fixing schemes, protecting them from community members, or simply doing things which are not in the interest of those they are serving but rather based upon what is administratively convenient.

The possibility of changing human services via some kind of full frontal attack of the models on which they are based is worthy of effort. However, perhaps a better way is to demonstrate a model of supporting people, based on scripture, that doesn't entirely rely on government programs but rather on relationships with people.

McNair

Favoring others over persons with disabilities

I grabbed my Bible yesterday morning just to do some reading and opened it up to James 2. It is a very powerful passage that I have blogged about in the past (see Favoritism Forbidden). I have been using the New Living Translation in my reading recently. Well the translation of verse 1 kinda slapped me in the face! It says,

"My dear brothers and sisters, how can you claim to have faith in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ if you favor some people over others?"

I knew the passage addressed favoritism, in particular related to people in wealth or poverty, but the lessons are generally the same for favoring one group of people with a perceived positive characteristic over another with a characteristic thought to be less desirable. James goes on to indicate how this way of treating people is both wrong and actually somewhat foolish when it is unpacked. But I was struck by the power of the translation. You can't have faith in Jesus if you favor some people over others.

I am unsure of what this means for the faith of the Christian church generally because we do this all the time in reference to persons with disabilities. It goes back to a recent posting on this blog related to structural injustice. There is structural injustice and institutional favoritism of some people over others.

I received an email from a disability ministry leader whose name readers would know. She told me of how the criteria for being a deacon in a particular denomination basically would exclude people from that type of service because they couldn't meet the academic nature of the criteria. People who are excellent at service in myriad ways would be excluded from this leadership role because of structures established by the church. Now I can't say that the reason for these criteria was to exclude persons with intellectual disabilities, for example, however that is the result nonetheless. These structures actually teach exclusion, teach favoritism as the acceptable position of the church. Now I get it. I should not be your worship leader because I do not play the guitar very well. I get it. However, poor guitar playing should not keep me from being a deacon, a role that revolves around service. In the same way, theological expertise should also not keep me from being a leader in serving others.

I have told this story in this blog before, but I once attended a church where a man with intellectual disabilities had for many years been one of the people on the rotation to serve communion. When his week/month came up he joined the group who passed the juice cups and crackers to the congregation. However, when there was a change over in the elders of the church, one who was a psychologist said it was inappropriate for the man (who had been successfully serving communion without incident) to participate in this form of service because of what the psychologist described as his "mental age." As an aside, please don't talk about someone's mental age around me as I will confront you about what exactly that means. It is little more than an insult to speak of someone's mental age. So from that point forward that man was excluded from serving communion.

These are the types of things leaders teach congregations. If leaders don't understand they should not show favoritism then we need to teach them that they shouldn't show favoritism. You can cite the James 2:1 verse above. Also ask them about 1 Corinthians 12:21, The eye can never say to the hand, "I don't need you"  The head can't say to the feet, "I don't need you.". You can also look at verses 22-23 of that same passage. Or even 1 John 4:20 which says, for if we don't love people we can see, how can we love God, whom we cannot see?

In the notes in the NLT regarding this chapter, it says the following (p 2771).
Showing favoritism. Why is it wrong to show favoritism to the wealthy?
1. It is inconsistent with Christ's teachings.
2. It results from evil thoughts.
3. It insults people made in God's image.
4. It is a by-product of selfish motives.
5. It goes against the biblical definition of love.
6. It shows a lack of mercy to those less fortunate.
7. It is hypocritical.
8. It is sin.

So be bold in pointing out favoritism when it excludes people for irrelevant characteristics. Although it won't make you popular, you will be representing the Heart of God.

McNair

Structural injustice

As a college student, one of my roommates happened to be an African-American guy. I remember once asking him,

"People talk about institutional racism, but being a white guy who is involved in athletics, I don't see it. Do you experience it?"
He looked at me patiently and said, "Absolutely!"
"Will you help me to see it?" I asked in all sincerity.

Those semesters that we lived together were truly eye opening as he relayed daily experiences that I was totally unaware of. I began to see things that I had never seen before. Many of the things were stupid things that could have been easily stopped. But they persisted nonetheless. Although I didn't understand the term at that time, what I learned from my friend was what might be called structural injustice. Sure there are people who can be purposely discriminatory towards someone else. But what he helped me to see was something else. Some thing that was present but sometimes, not always, hidden in the structures.

In the book One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Chief Bromden talks about the combine. It is everywhere, in the walls and it controls everything, particularly in the ward where he lived. It was the negativity the control that he felt. He called the ward where he lived the factory of the combine. The point is that it was pervasive, institutionalized, within the structures which surrounded Bromden both physically and socially.

What are the structural injustices which live within the church as it relates to persons with disabilities? One must first ask if there are structural injustices? Although others might disagree, I have to say that I believe there is such structural injustice. Once again, they aren't always a deliberate act on someone's part to be an agent of injustice. But injustice is experienced nonetheless. I have often used this quote from Wolfensberger in this blog but I will cite him once more. He says, "Thus for many people to all work toward a bad thing requires no deliberate or conscious conspiracy...most citizens are not aware of how they themselves can be totally unconsciously acting out undeclared, large-scale, societal policies in their own daily lives (from "A leadership-oriented introductory social role valorization (SRV) workshop, February 27, 2007). We can find ourselves in an unreflective pattern of living that we have been taught or socialized into. To break out of that pattern requires something remarkable to happen in us; we need to see how we unconsciously "all work toward a bad thing."

In regards to persons with disabilities in the church, we can say that we just didn't know about the structural injustice which might actually be true. If we are brave, we can ask those with disabilities about whether and how they experience structural injustice. And, just as my roommate helped me to see, we can help others and be helped to see things which are actually somewhat obvious once we are made aware. A good starting point would be for me to take my life experience and just compare it to the life experience of someone else. Say for example, a person with intellectual disability or someone who uses a wheelchair. What can I do, what opportunities do I have that he can't do or doesn't have? Why is it that there are those differences? Are they in any way justifiable? If not, why do we allow them to continue? Are there actual structures socially and otherwise which should not be present?

The church should NOT be the agent of structural injustice. Lets look for it reflectively and root it out.

McNair

Podcast of Jeff McNair interviewed by Pastor Nick In't Hout

I was honored to be interviewed by a pastor Nick In't Hout, Associate Pastor at The River CRC of Redlands, California a while back. The interview was fun and covers a variety of subjects.
It is entitled, "Ep. 012 - Dialogue 3: Disabled Christianity".
Here is the link if you are interested in listening.
https://podfanatic.com/podcast/the-love-shared-podcast/episode/ep-012-dialogue-3-disabled-christianity-1

God bless,
McNair