The Disabled Church

Author : Rebecca F. Spurrier
Publisher : Fordham University Press
ISBN 13 : 0823285545
Total Pages : 408 pages
Book Rating : 4.49/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Disabled Church written by Rebecca F. Spurrier and published by Fordham University Press. This book was released on 2019-10-01 with total page 408 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How do communities consent to difference? How do they recognize and create the space and time necessary for the differences and disabilities of those who constitute them? Christian congregations often make assumptions about the shared abilities, practices, and experiences that are necessary for communal worship. The author of this provocative new book takes a hard look at these assumptions through a detailed ethnographic study of an unusual religious community where more than half the congregants live with diagnoses of mental illness, many coming to the church from personal care homes or independent living facilities. Here, people’s participation in worship disrupts and extends the formal orders of worship. Whenever one worships God at Sacred Family Church, there is someone who is doing it differently. Here, the author argues, the central elements and the participation in the symbols of Christian worship raise questions rather than supply clear markers of unity, prompting the question, What do you need in order to have a church that assumes difference at its heart? Based on three years of ethnographic research, The Disabled Church describes how the Sacred Family community, comprising people with very different mental abilities, backgrounds, and resources, sustains and embodies a common religious identity. It explores how an ethic of difference is both helped and hindered by a church’s embodied theology. Paying careful attention to how these congregants improvise forms of access to a common liturgy, this book offers a groundbreaking theology of worship that engages both the fragility and beauty revealed by difference within the church. As liturgy requires consent to difference rather than coercion, an aesthetic approach to differences within Christian liturgy provides a frame for congregations and Christian liturgists to pay attention to the differences and disabilities of worshippers. This book creates a distinctive conversation between critical disability studies, liturgical aesthetics, and ethnographic theology, offering an original perspective on the relationship between beauty and disability within Christian communities. Here is a transformational theological aesthetics of Christian liturgy that prioritizes human difference and argues for the importance of the Disabled Church.

Author : Lamar Hardwick
Publisher : InterVarsity Press
ISBN 13 : 083084161X
Total Pages : 214 pages
Book Rating : 4.15/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Disability and the Church written by Lamar Hardwick and published by InterVarsity Press. This book was released on 2021-02-09 with total page 214 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: IVP Readers' Choice Award Lamar Hardwick was thirty-six years old when he found out he was on the autism spectrum. While this revelation helped him understand and process his own experience, it also prompted a difficult re-evaluation of who he was as a person. And as a pastor, it started him on a new path of considering the way disabled people are treated in the church. Disability and the Church is a practical and theological reconsideration of the church's responsibilities to the disabled community. Too often disabled persons are pushed away from the church or made to feel unwelcome in any number of ways. As Hardwick writes, "This should not be." He insists that the good news of Jesus affirms God's image in all people, and he offers practical steps and strategies to build stronger, truly inclusive communities of faith.

Author : John Gillibrand
Publisher : Jessica Kingsley Publishers
ISBN 13 : 9780857003614
Total Pages : 208 pages
Book Rating : 4.15/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Disabled Church - Disabled Society written by John Gillibrand and published by Jessica Kingsley Publishers. This book was released on 2010-02-15 with total page 208 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this moving and intelligent book John Gillibrand, an Anglican priest, draws on his experience of caring for his non-verbal son, Adam, who has autism and is now a teenager. He reflects on how the experience has changed not just his life, but also his whole way of thinking about theology, politics and philosophy. Illuminated by an account of his day to day experiences with Adam, and deeper reflection upon the meaning of that experience, John Gillibrand considers the challenges that autism - and disability in general - present to the western tradition of thought in theology and philosophy. His experiences lead him to consider the place of people with autism in relation to religion and philosophy, and how the difficulties in providing adequate public services for those with autism and their carers point to a need for radical transformation of western political structures. This thoughtful and incisive book will be of interest to theologians, philosophers and sociologists, as well as to all those trying to integrate people with autism into society. Parents and carers will find much to reflect on. Shortlisted for the Michael Ramsey Prize for theological writing 2013.

Author : Michael S. Beates
Publisher : Crossway
ISBN 13 : 1433530481
Total Pages : 192 pages
Book Rating : 4.87/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Disability and the Gospel written by Michael S. Beates and published by Crossway. This book was released on 2012-07-31 with total page 192 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Michael Beates's concern with disability issues began nearly 30 years ago when his eldest child was born with multiple profound disabilities. Now, as more families like Michael's are affected by a growing number of difficulties ranging from down syndrome to autism to food allergies, the need for church programs and personal paradigm shifts is greater than ever. Working through key Bible passages on brokenness and disability while answering hard questions, Michael offers here helpful principles for believers and their churches. He shows us how to embrace our own brokenness and then to embrace those who are more physically and visibly broken, bringing hope and vision to those of us who need it most.

Author : Amy Kenny
Publisher : Baker Books
ISBN 13 : 1493437097
Total Pages : 217 pages
Book Rating : 4.92/5 ( download)

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Download or read book My Body Is Not a Prayer Request written by Amy Kenny and published by Baker Books. This book was released on 2022-05-17 with total page 217 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "With humorous prose and wry wit, Kenny makes a convincing case for all Christians to do more to meet access needs and embrace disabilities as part of God's kingdom. . . . Inclusivity-minded Christians will cheer the lessons laid out here."--Publishers Weekly Much of the church has forgotten that we worship a disabled God whose wounds survived resurrection, says Amy Kenny. It is time for the church to start treating disabled people as full members of the body of Christ who have much more to offer than a miraculous cure narrative and to learn from their embodied experiences. Written by a disabled Christian, this book shows that the church is missing out on the prophetic witness and blessing of disability. Kenny reflects on her experiences inside the church to expose unintentional ableism and cast a new vision for Christian communities to engage disability justice. She shows that until we cultivate church spaces where people with disabilities can fully belong, flourish, and lead, we are not valuing the diverse members of the body of Christ. Offering a unique blend of personal storytelling, fresh and compelling writing, biblical exegesis, and practical application, this book invites readers to participate in disability justice and create a more inclusive community in church and parachurch spaces. Engaging content such as reflection questions and top-ten lists are included.

Author : Larry J. Waters
Publisher : Crossway
ISBN 13 : 1433525836
Total Pages : 338 pages
Book Rating : 4.34/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Why, O God? (Foreword by Randy Alcorn) written by Larry J. Waters and published by Crossway. This book was released on 2011-07-07 with total page 338 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: With two in seven American families affected by disability, the body of Christ has a great opportunity for ministry. This new anthology uniquely points the way, training churches, caregivers, pastors, and counselors to compassionately respond. The book's contributors—ranging from Joni Eareckson Tada and others living with disabilities, to seminary professors, ministry leaders, and medical professionals—do more than offer a biblical perspective on suffering and disability; they draw from very personal experiences to explore Christians' responsibility toward those who suffer. The volume addresses various disabilities and age-related challenges, end-of-life issues, global suffering, and other concerns—all the while reminding readers that as they seek to help the hurting, they will be ministered to in return. This unprecedented work, which includes a foreword by Randy Alcorn, belongs in the hands of every Christian worker and caring individual who is seeking a real-world, biblical perspective on suffering.

Author : Nancy L. Eiesland
Publisher : Abingdon Press
ISBN 13 : 1426719310
Total Pages : 79 pages
Book Rating : 4.18/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Disabled God written by Nancy L. Eiesland and published by Abingdon Press. This book was released on 1994-09-01 with total page 79 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Draws on themes of the disability-rights movement to identify people with disabilities as members of a socially disadvantaged minority group rather than as individuals who need to adjust. Highlights the hidden history of people with disabilities in church and society. Proclaiming the emancipatory presence of the disabled God, the author maintains the vital importance of the relationship between Christology and social change. Eiesland contends that in the Eucharist, Christians encounter the disabled God and may participate in new imaginations of wholeness and new embodiments of justice.

Author : Bethany McKinney Fox
Publisher : InterVarsity Press
ISBN 13 : 0830872388
Total Pages : 223 pages
Book Rating : 4.81/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Disability and the Way of Jesus written by Bethany McKinney Fox and published by InterVarsity Press. This book was released on 2019-05-28 with total page 223 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 2019 IVP Readers' Choice Award What does healing mean for people with disabilities? The Gospels are filled with accounts of Jesus offering physical healing. But even as churches today seek to follow the way of Jesus, people with disabilities all too often experience the very opposite of healing and life-giving community: exclusion, judgment, barriers. Misinterpretation and misapplication of biblical healing narratives can do great damage, yet those who take the Bible seriously mustn't avoid these passages either. Bethany McKinney Fox believes that Christian communities are better off when people with disabilities are an integral part of our common life. In Disability and the Way of Jesus, she considers how the stories of Jesus' healings can guide us toward mutual thriving. How did Jesus' original audience understand his works of healing, and how should we relate to these texts today? After examining the healing narratives in their biblical and cultural contexts, Fox considers perspectives from medical doctors, disability scholars, and pastors to more fully understand what Jesus does as he heals and how he points the way for relationships with people with disabilities. Personal reflections from Christians with disabilities are featured throughout the book, which concludes with suggestions for concrete practices adaptable to a variety of church settings. Bridging biblical studies, ethics, and disability studies with the work of practitioners, Fox provides a unique resource that is both theologically grounded and winsomely practical. Disability and the Way of Jesus provides new lenses on holistic healing for scholars, laypeople, and ministry leaders who care about welcoming all people as Jesus would.

Author : Rev. Dr. Theresa C. Taylor
Publisher : WestBow Press
ISBN 13 : 1973642875
Total Pages : 166 pages
Book Rating : 4.79/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Enabling the Disabled written by Rev. Dr. Theresa C. Taylor and published by WestBow Press. This book was released on 2018-10-23 with total page 166 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Are you looking for church growth? Maybe you need more volunteers? Do you want to tap into the largest group of unreached people in the United States and in the world? Do you know what this group is? They are our neighbors, and they are in this group simply because they are disabled. Enabling the Disabled will help you get to know those with disabilities, and it will show you what they can and will bring to your church family. Disabilities hit all of us at one point in time, whether they are temporary or permanent. And disabilities cross over all social groups. But God commands us to love our neighbor, and he doesn’t qualify this by saying only love those you are comfortable with. Author Rev. Dr. Theresa C. Taylor encourages you to welcome them with a genuine desire to have them become part of the body of Christ. God wants each of us to dance at his throne in heaven, regardless of what our physical circumstances may be while we sojourn on the earth. So what are you doing to help the disabled glorify God? Enabling the Disabled will give you the understanding and the tools you need to do a better job welcoming the disabled into your church.

Author : Amy Fenton Lee
Publisher : B&H Publishing Group
ISBN 13 : 1433647125
Total Pages : 216 pages
Book Rating : 4.23/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Leading a Special Needs Ministry written by Amy Fenton Lee and published by B&H Publishing Group. This book was released on 2016-09 with total page 216 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What do you need to lead a special needs ministry? Leading a Special Needs Ministry is a practical how-to guide for the family ministry team working to welcome one or 100 children with special needs.