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Serving As Christ's Welcoming Arms

Mary Jane Owen, TOP, MSW

There can be no separate Church for persons with disabilities.  We are one single flock that serves a single shepherd.

Welcome and Justice for Persons with Disabilities:
A Framework of Access and Inclusion
USCCB – 1999

A Jesus who carries a crippled lamb unable to keep up with the flock comforts millions of Christians as we acknowledge our shared vulnerability.  NCEA’s video, “The Arms of God,” validates our role in the “redemption of hope” for all our youth as we view the crucified Christ who has lost his arms.  Through this symbolic disablement of our Lord, we recognize the importance of our work of educating and altering our contemporary culture.          

Our documents call Catholics to embrace those families unprepared for the birth of a disabled child; to become informed about disabilities and to offer ongoing support to such children. (1)  But are we in a position to welcome these youngsters and do we have the resources to carry those who are disabled?

We’d like to think we are addressing these challenges and are heartened by the November 2002 study commissioned by USCCB’s Department of Education.  It affirms Catholic schools serve “special needs children in all disability areas” and that 7% of those children is disabled.  National surveys indicate that slightly over 7 percent of the nation’s children have a disability.  So we’re doing great, right?

But if that is true, why does the National Catholic Partnership on Disability (NCPD) continue to receive so many tearful calls from parents who seek a place for their youngsters in their parish schools and religious education classes?  Why do they find so many barriers they can not breach?

NCPD (formerly called the National Catholic Office for Persons with Disabilities) has been designated as the source for consultation and assistance in fulfilling the inclusive idealism of documents issued by our bishops.  And so, as these parents search for answers, they call us and we listen to stories which become repetitious: “Father said we must not abort our baby, even though the doctors told us our youngest child would be disabled.  He said our baby would be a gift to our family, to the parish and to the community.  So if that is true why is there no room for our child in our parish worship; our parish school?’

The welcoming words of our bishops and the reality that more doors of opportunity are opening every year fail to calm parental frustration.  For them life is short and their experiences have exhausted their patience.

Recent stories involve fellow parishioners raising funds for a ramp followed by the official judgment, “You let one child like that in and there will be others pounding on the door.”  There is the report of a young child working with his brothers and sisters to learn new skills in preparation for kindergarten and then the parents learning,  “We only want winners in our school.”  They think their son is a winner and have moved on to another faith community.

As teachers and religious educators we have text books, essays, training materials, seminars and factual solutions available to help us strategize toward inclusion.  We are supporting a sophisticated campaign to encourage federal funding under IDEA to flow into our schools.  When those moneys become available we hope to be able to address the demands of frustrated parents.  We are not disinterested but the difference between our priorities and the immediate need for inclusive and normalizing Catholic educational options can feel like painful rejection.

Historical Reality Challenges Us
           While some of us weren’t looking, a shifting paradigm replaced the medical model.  Advocates no longer view those with disabilities as “special” and suggest the environment “handicaps” the individual and stunts his or her development.  Disabilities are being redefined as the “normal” outcome of the risks and stresses of the living process, since God continues to place his gift of life in very vulnerable bodies.

            A few decades ago the idea that people with disabilities might be considered a distinct minority, discriminated against as a class, was unthinkable.  Our Catholic programs were benevolent.  Alms and charity were offered those unfortunate enough to have become “crippled” or ”defective” until an early death took them mercifully out of their misery.  Their suffering might inspire others, but precious few were considered able to fill any meaningful role within the Church or society.  But secular responses to civil rights demands have altered parental expectations.

            Medical professionals save or salvage individuals with a range of disabilities while rehabilitationists and technology bring new knowledge and strategies which provide alternative ways to accomplish tasks previously dependent upon lost or missing functional capabilities.  Catholic educators who value God’s gift of life are confronted with a growing challenge.  If we fail to respond to heightened expectations we risk decreasing the day to day relevance of our faith in the lives of families touched by disabilities.  Catholic parents with children whose disabilities make them “inappropriate candidates” for our schools are begging us to help carry the burden of opening doors of opportunity to the children they love.

The Catalytic Effect of Impairments
            Each child, born with significant impairments who struggles to survive and thrive confirms the miracle of the gift of life.  When we segregate the strong and athletic from those who could teach patience and the joy of feeling needed we’ve missed a “catalytic moment.”  We prevent the quick of mind from interacting with those who would allow them to grasp the satisfaction that follows when we are allowed to share newly acquired skills and knowledge.  When our youngsters are “allowed’ to experience the satisfaction of assisting another, they can learn lessons not always included in our curriculum.  When our religious education departments create an environment in which the weak and the strong, the abstract thinker and the concrete minded, the quick and the slower come together in formation of the Faith, we experience the miracle which is illuminated in that diversity.  As long as we foster total independence, emphasize winning and shy away from those whose limitations foster greater awareness of interaction, we fail to profit from the potential catalytic effect offered by our shared human fragility.

While those who are labeled as mentally retarded, or cognitively disabled, are not a large portion of the millions of Catholics with disabilities, they present a particularly unsettling challenge to many Catholic educators.  In fact the USCCB survey confirms that our parish schools fall far short of the public schools in accepting children with mental retardation and developmental delays. (1.16% vs. 10.81% and 0.34% vs. 3.43%)           

Yet these concrete minded youngsters can highlight Christ’s lessons.  Anyone who has assisted with Special Olympics can attest to their failure to understand the need to win at the expense of others.  They may race with all their hearts but will stop to help a fallen friend.

Multiple Intelligences and Our Traditions
            Howard Gardner’s original seven multiple intelligences: linguistic, musical, logical/mathematical, spatial, body/kinesthetic, interpersonal and interpersonal expanded our view of the diverse functional capacity of children.  Our previous palette of instructional options limited our vision of possibilities.

            John Paul II in Tertio Millennio Adveniente (1994) reminds us of the same diversity, telling us we should use outward, visible, audible and tangible methods to illustrate the meaning of our Faith.  When we use visual means, we create increased understanding for those who are deaf, hard of hearing and the many who find information most understandable and best remembered when presented through vision.  By utilizing auditory means we create increased understanding for those who are blind, visually impaired or who prefer this path to learning and remembering.  “Hands-on” and concrete lesson plans certainly appeal to those with assorted cognitive disabilities including mental retardation.

            As Catholics we have used these strategies for centuries.  Our predecessors used sculpture, paintings and colorful garments and altars; music, gongs, bells and singing; kneeling, standing, as well as movement at the altar and the smells of incense and flowers, to mention a few examples.  While these venerable communication tools are used in our worship environments they have not always been incorporated into our religious teaching or lesson plans.

Our Faith Calls for Inclusion
           In 1978 our bishops noted: “Religious education personnel could profit from guidance in adapting their curriculum into the needs of learners with disabilities, and Catholic elementary and secondary school teacher could be provided in-service training in how best to integrate students with disabilities into programs of regular education” (USCB, 1978, p 36).

            We are seeking a fair share of federal funds which will aid us in fulfilling the charge to do the best possible job of educating the next generation of Catholics to fulfill their individual and unique God-given talents.  But let us remember the lessons of our Faith.  What Christ did with a few fish and loaves may seem to be only a miracle of the past but with God’s blessing and our efforts in promoting the need for inclusion, miracles for individual children will surely take place in our classrooms and parishes.

            There may be no better way to end this analysis than by quoting Jean M. Barton (2000):

            To be truly Catholic, education must be inclusive.  “To teach as Jesus did” is not easy, but it is possible if we ask ourselves the right questions and work together as a community of learners on a quest for a difficult but not impossible goal.  The goal is to develop the God-given gifts in each learner to the fullest and to help students to appreciate all gifts and celebrate diversity, seeing the adaptive benefit of “different gifts” as collectively complementary.  We must begin by asking, “How is each gifted?” not “Who is gifted?”  “How can we teach so each can learn?” not “Who cannot learn in our school?”  “How can we work together to make inclusion possible?” not “To include or not to include?”  If we ask the right questions and work together, we can create schools that provide a truly Catholic education for all students and are models of academic excellence for others to emulate.

References
Barton, Jean M. (2000) “To Include or Not to Include?  That is Not the Question.” Catholic Education: A Journal of  
     Inquiry and Practice, Vol. 3. No. 3.
John Paul II, (1994) Tertio Millennio Adveniente, Vatican City; Author.
United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, (1978), Pastoral Statement of U.S. Catholic Bishops on Person with
     Disabilities, Washington, DC; Author.
United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (2002) Catholic School Children with Disabilities: A Study
     Commissioned by the department of education, Washington, DC; Author.

Resources from the National Catholic Partnership on Disability
Web site: - www.ncpd.org
Opening Doors to People with Disabilities
     Volume I: Pastoral Manual.  213  pp.
     Volume II: The Resource File. 1,400 pp.
A Loving Justice: The Moral and Legal Responsibilities of the U.S. Catholic Church under the Americans with
     Disabilities Act. 58 pp.
Disability Ministry: Perspectives on Disability. A training video.

Sources of Additional Information
National Apostolate for Inclusion Ministry (NAfIM) - www.nafim.org.
National Catholic Office for the Deaf (NCOD) - www.ncod.org.
Network of Inclusive Catholic Educators (NICE) - www.udayton.edu/~ipi/nice/index.php3.

Mary Jane Owen is a 3^rd order Dominican and has been executive director of NCPD since 1991.  Previously a professor and psychiatric social worker, she has been cited as the outstanding philosopher of the disability rights movement.  She brings that background into a theological context. (mjowen@ncpd.org)

     This article appeared in MOMENTUM, the official journal of the National Catholic Educational Association, Washington, DC November/December, 2003

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