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Abstract
Since Amplifying Our Witness: Giving Voice to Adolescents with Developmental Disabilities was published in 2012, little else has been written on disability and youth ministry. This article reflects on the ministry behind the book eleven years later, considers some of the important changes in the landscape of youth culture and disability in that time period, and calls for resources that address this reality written by scholars/practitioners who share life with disabled youth, are themselves disabled, and preferably both.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.
Notes
1 An important program, one of two of its kind in the US, that is, sadly, not taking any more registrants.
2 Find a version of it in the introduction to Practicing Witness: A Missional Vision of Christian Practices (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2011) or listen to my conversation with the wonderful hosts of The Two Cities podcast at http://www.thetwocities.com/
3 This national organization has many local chapters. Their mission is, “Promoting and protecting the human rights of people with intellectual and developmental disabilities and actively supporting their full inclusion and participation in the community throughout their lifetimes,” https://thearc.org/
4 Not his actual name.
5 Personal correspondence, 2010, date not recorded.
6 See the important work being done by The Missing Voices Project at Flagler College led by Justin Forbes, https://missingvoices.flagler.edu/
7 See the opinion piece by Tish Warren Harrision, “Why Churches Should Drop Their Online Services” New York Times, January 30, 2022 https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/30/opinion/church-online-services-covid.html, and the backlash on Twitter and beyond.
8 https://www.cnn.com/2023/03/29/health/us-children-gun-deaths-dg/index.html, accessed April 20, 2023.
9 https://www.autismspeaks.org/press-release/cdc-estimate-autism-prevalence-increases-nearly-10-percent-1-54-children-us, accessed April 13, 2023.
10 https://www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/autism/data.html, accessed April 13, 2023.
11 The disability and theology corpus included works by Jean Vanier, Henri Nouwen, Han Reinders, Tom Reynolds, John Swinton, Brian Brock, Bill Gaventa, Brett Webb-Mitchell (early on), Stanley Hauerwas (using disability as a means to think through ethics) and others. Biblical studies always seemed to have women more prominently involved.
12 Amy Kenny, My Body is Not a Prayer Request: Disability Justice in the Church (Grand Rapids: Brazos Press, 2022); Lamar Hardwick, Disability and the Church: A Vision for Diversity and Inclusion (Downers Grove: IVP, 2021).
13 https://fulleryouthinstitute.org/blog/5-tips-to-rethink-the-strengths-and-gifts-of-youth-with-disabilities, accessed April 13, 2023. For an example of Princeton Theological Seminary’s offerings, listen to “A Vision for Disability and Ministry” from the The Distillery podcast, https://www.ptsem.edu/news/a-vision-for-disability-and-ministry and engage the material from the Disability & Faith Forum, https://disabilityandfaith.org/princeton-disability-and-youth-ministry-conference-reflections/
14 “Inside the Adolescent Mental Health Crisis: Young people in the Unites States are facing a new set of risks. What has the situation caught so many people off guard?” https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/30/podcasts/the-daily/teens-mental-health-crisis.html, accessed April 14, 2023.
15 https://www.springtideresearch.org/community/podcast, accessed April 15, 2023. See also, The State of Religion & Young People: What Faith Leaders Need to Know (Springtide Research Institute, 2022).
16 The purpose gap is, in short, the gap between one’s internal sense of calling or vocation and the external barriers to flourishing. While Reyes is addressing the purpose gap in relation to race, his arguments and insights apply equally well to those persons who experience a purpose gap due to ableism. Reyes posits, if “vocation is the call to life, then I claim here that external conditions have as much to do with one finding one’s purpose as does one’s internal discernment” (Reyes, 22). There is no way to talk about vocation and disability without addressing the larger social, academic, and ecclesial environment that pushes against flourishing and purpose.
17 The books in the series will be co-branded Intervarsity Academic and Western Theological Seminary’s Center for Disability and Ministry, Center for Disability and Ministry Books. The first book slated to be published fall 2023 is Disabling Leadership: A Practical Theology for the Broken Body of Christ written collectively by Andrew Draper, Jody Michele, and Andrea Mae, all of whom are either disabled, have disabled children, or both.