Author: Deborah Beth Creamer
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199709076
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 167
Book Description
Attention to embodiment and the religious significance of bodies is one of the most significant shifts in contemporary theology. In the midst of this, however, experiences of disability have received little attention. This book explores possibilities for theological engagement with disability, focusing on three primary alternatives: challenging existing theological models to engage with the disabled body, considering possibilities for a disability liberation theology, and exploring new theological options based on an understanding of the unsurprisingness of human limits. The overarching perspective of this book is that limits are an unavoidable aspect of being human, a fact we often seem to forget or deny. Yet not only do all humans experience limits, most of us also experience limits that take the form of disability at some point in our lives; in this way, disability is more "normal" than non-disability. If we take such experiences seriously and refuse to reduce them to mere instances of suffering, we discover insights that are lost when we take a perfect or generic body as our starting point for theological reflections. While possible applications of this insight are vast, this work focuses on two areas of particular interest: theological anthropology and metaphors for God. This project challenges theology to consider the undeniable diversity of human embodiment. It also enriches previous disability work by providing an alternative to the dominant medical and minority models, both of which fail to acknowledge the full diversity of disability experiences. Most notably, this project offers new images and possibilities for theological construction that attend appropriately and creatively to diversity in human embodiment.
Disability and Christian Theology Embodied Limits and Constructive Possibilities
Author: Deborah Beth Creamer
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199709076
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 167
Book Description
Attention to embodiment and the religious significance of bodies is one of the most significant shifts in contemporary theology. In the midst of this, however, experiences of disability have received little attention. This book explores possibilities for theological engagement with disability, focusing on three primary alternatives: challenging existing theological models to engage with the disabled body, considering possibilities for a disability liberation theology, and exploring new theological options based on an understanding of the unsurprisingness of human limits. The overarching perspective of this book is that limits are an unavoidable aspect of being human, a fact we often seem to forget or deny. Yet not only do all humans experience limits, most of us also experience limits that take the form of disability at some point in our lives; in this way, disability is more "normal" than non-disability. If we take such experiences seriously and refuse to reduce them to mere instances of suffering, we discover insights that are lost when we take a perfect or generic body as our starting point for theological reflections. While possible applications of this insight are vast, this work focuses on two areas of particular interest: theological anthropology and metaphors for God. This project challenges theology to consider the undeniable diversity of human embodiment. It also enriches previous disability work by providing an alternative to the dominant medical and minority models, both of which fail to acknowledge the full diversity of disability experiences. Most notably, this project offers new images and possibilities for theological construction that attend appropriately and creatively to diversity in human embodiment.
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199709076
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 167
Book Description
Attention to embodiment and the religious significance of bodies is one of the most significant shifts in contemporary theology. In the midst of this, however, experiences of disability have received little attention. This book explores possibilities for theological engagement with disability, focusing on three primary alternatives: challenging existing theological models to engage with the disabled body, considering possibilities for a disability liberation theology, and exploring new theological options based on an understanding of the unsurprisingness of human limits. The overarching perspective of this book is that limits are an unavoidable aspect of being human, a fact we often seem to forget or deny. Yet not only do all humans experience limits, most of us also experience limits that take the form of disability at some point in our lives; in this way, disability is more "normal" than non-disability. If we take such experiences seriously and refuse to reduce them to mere instances of suffering, we discover insights that are lost when we take a perfect or generic body as our starting point for theological reflections. While possible applications of this insight are vast, this work focuses on two areas of particular interest: theological anthropology and metaphors for God. This project challenges theology to consider the undeniable diversity of human embodiment. It also enriches previous disability work by providing an alternative to the dominant medical and minority models, both of which fail to acknowledge the full diversity of disability experiences. Most notably, this project offers new images and possibilities for theological construction that attend appropriately and creatively to diversity in human embodiment.
Theology and the Experience of Disability
Author: Andrew Picard
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317011147
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 301
Book Description
The Christian gospel compels humanity to embrace deeper ways of being human together that will overcome false divisions and exclusions in search of flourishing and graced communities. Presenting both short narratives emerging out of theological reflection on experience and analytical essays arising from engagement in scholarly conversations Theology and the Experience of Disability is a conscious attempt to develop theology by and with people with disabilities instead of theology about people with disabilities. A mixture of academic, professional, practical, and/or lived experience is brought to the topic in search of constructive multi-disciplinary proposals for church and society. The result is an interdisciplinary engagement with the constructive possibilities that emerge from a distinctly Christian understanding of disability as lived experience.
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317011147
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 301
Book Description
The Christian gospel compels humanity to embrace deeper ways of being human together that will overcome false divisions and exclusions in search of flourishing and graced communities. Presenting both short narratives emerging out of theological reflection on experience and analytical essays arising from engagement in scholarly conversations Theology and the Experience of Disability is a conscious attempt to develop theology by and with people with disabilities instead of theology about people with disabilities. A mixture of academic, professional, practical, and/or lived experience is brought to the topic in search of constructive multi-disciplinary proposals for church and society. The result is an interdisciplinary engagement with the constructive possibilities that emerge from a distinctly Christian understanding of disability as lived experience.
Theology and Down Syndrome
Author: Amos Yong
Publisher: Baylor University Press
ISBN: 1602580065
Category : Church work with people with disabilities
Languages : en
Pages : 465
Book Description
"While the struggle for disability rights has transformed secular ethics and public policy, traditional Christian teaching has been slow to account for disability in its theological imagination. Amos Yong crafts both a theology of disability and a theology informed by disability. The result is a Christian theology that not only connects with our present social, medical, and scientific understanding of disability but also one that empowers a set of best practices appropriate to our late modern context"--Publisher description.
Publisher: Baylor University Press
ISBN: 1602580065
Category : Church work with people with disabilities
Languages : en
Pages : 465
Book Description
"While the struggle for disability rights has transformed secular ethics and public policy, traditional Christian teaching has been slow to account for disability in its theological imagination. Amos Yong crafts both a theology of disability and a theology informed by disability. The result is a Christian theology that not only connects with our present social, medical, and scientific understanding of disability but also one that empowers a set of best practices appropriate to our late modern context"--Publisher description.
Disability and the Gospel
Author: Michael S. Beates
Publisher: Crossway
ISBN: 1433530481
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 192
Book Description
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.
Publisher: Crossway
ISBN: 1433530481
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 192
Book Description
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.
Of Such is the Kingdom
Author: Summer Kinard
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781944967611
Category : Church work with people with disabilities
Languages : en
Pages : 294
Book Description
Disability is not a boundary to holiness, because God is with us. But it can sometimes be an obstacle to full participation in the life of the Church, simply because many do not understand what is needed to help people with disabilities overcome any physical, mental, or interpersonal challenges they may face in church and in leading an Orthodox Christian life. This book addresses the question from theological, practical, and experiential perspectives, giving individuals and families with disabilities the opportunity to voice their needs and suggest some things the rest of us can do to make them welcome in the household of God.
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781944967611
Category : Church work with people with disabilities
Languages : en
Pages : 294
Book Description
Disability is not a boundary to holiness, because God is with us. But it can sometimes be an obstacle to full participation in the life of the Church, simply because many do not understand what is needed to help people with disabilities overcome any physical, mental, or interpersonal challenges they may face in church and in leading an Orthodox Christian life. This book addresses the question from theological, practical, and experiential perspectives, giving individuals and families with disabilities the opportunity to voice their needs and suggest some things the rest of us can do to make them welcome in the household of God.
A Constructive Theology of Intellectual Disability
Author: Molly Claire Haslam
Publisher: Fordham Univ Press
ISBN: 0823239403
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 145
Book Description
Responding to how little theological research has been done on intellectual (as opposed to physical) disability, this book asks, on behalf of individuals with profound intellectual disabilities, what it means to be human. That question has traditionally been answered with an emphasis on an intellectual capacity--the ability to employ concepts or to make moral choices--and has ignored the value of individuals who lack such intellectual capacities. The author suggests, rather, that human being be understood in terms of participation in relationships of mutual responsiveness, which includes but is not limited to intellectual forms of communicating. She supports her argument by developing a phenomenology of how an individual with a profound intellectual disability relates, drawn from her clinical experience as a physical therapist. She thereby demonstrates that these individuals participate in relationships of mutual responsiveness, though in nonsymbolic, bodily ways. To be human, to image God, she argues, is to respond to the world around us in any number of ways, bodily or symbolically. Such an understanding does not exclude people with intellectual disabilities but rather includes them among those who participate in the image of God.
Publisher: Fordham Univ Press
ISBN: 0823239403
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 145
Book Description
Responding to how little theological research has been done on intellectual (as opposed to physical) disability, this book asks, on behalf of individuals with profound intellectual disabilities, what it means to be human. That question has traditionally been answered with an emphasis on an intellectual capacity--the ability to employ concepts or to make moral choices--and has ignored the value of individuals who lack such intellectual capacities. The author suggests, rather, that human being be understood in terms of participation in relationships of mutual responsiveness, which includes but is not limited to intellectual forms of communicating. She supports her argument by developing a phenomenology of how an individual with a profound intellectual disability relates, drawn from her clinical experience as a physical therapist. She thereby demonstrates that these individuals participate in relationships of mutual responsiveness, though in nonsymbolic, bodily ways. To be human, to image God, she argues, is to respond to the world around us in any number of ways, bodily or symbolically. Such an understanding does not exclude people with intellectual disabilities but rather includes them among those who participate in the image of God.
Disability in the Christian Tradition
Author: Brian Brock
Publisher: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing
ISBN: 146743583X
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 577
Book Description
For two millennia Christians have thought about what human impairment is and how faith communities and society should respond to people with perceived impairments. But never has one volume collected the most significant Christian writings on disability. This book fills that gap. Brian Brock and John Swinton's Disability in the Christian Tradition brings together for the first time key writings by thinkers from all periods of Christian history - including Augustine, Aquinas, Julian of Norwich, Luther, Calvin, Hegel, Kierkegaard, Bonhoeffer, Barth, Hauerwas, and more. Fourteen contemporary experts in theology and disability studies guide readers through each era or group of thinkers, offering clear commentary and highlighting important themes.
Publisher: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing
ISBN: 146743583X
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 577
Book Description
For two millennia Christians have thought about what human impairment is and how faith communities and society should respond to people with perceived impairments. But never has one volume collected the most significant Christian writings on disability. This book fills that gap. Brian Brock and John Swinton's Disability in the Christian Tradition brings together for the first time key writings by thinkers from all periods of Christian history - including Augustine, Aquinas, Julian of Norwich, Luther, Calvin, Hegel, Kierkegaard, Bonhoeffer, Barth, Hauerwas, and more. Fourteen contemporary experts in theology and disability studies guide readers through each era or group of thinkers, offering clear commentary and highlighting important themes.
Vulnerable Communion
Author: Thomas E. Reynolds
Publisher: Brazos Press
ISBN: 1587431777
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 256
Book Description
A theologian and father of a child with disabilities reveals how disability highlights our common brokenness and need for grace.
Publisher: Brazos Press
ISBN: 1587431777
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 256
Book Description
A theologian and father of a child with disabilities reveals how disability highlights our common brokenness and need for grace.
The Disabled God
Author: Nancy L. Eiesland
Publisher: Abingdon Press
ISBN: 1426719310
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 79
Book Description
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.
Publisher: Abingdon Press
ISBN: 1426719310
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 79
Book Description
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.
Accessible Atonement
Author: Associate Tutor David McLachlan
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781481313674
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 225
Book Description
The atonement--where God in Jesus Christ addresses sin and the whole of the human predicament--lies at the heart of the Christian faith and life. Its saving power is for all people, and yet a deep hesitancy has prevented meaningful discussion of the cross' relevance for people with disabilities. Speaking of disability and the multifaceted concept of the atonement has created an unresolvable tension, not least because sin and disability often seem to be associated within the biblical text. While work in disability theology has made great progress in developing a positive theological framework for disability as an integral part of human diversity, it has so far fallen short of grappling with this particular set of interpretive challenges presented by the cross. In Accessible Atonement, reflecting on his experience as both a pastor and a theologian, David McLachlan brings the themes and objectives of disability theology into close conversation with traditional ideas of the cross as Jesus' sacrifice, justice, and victory. From this conversation emerges an account of the atonement as God's deepest, once-for-all participation in both the moral and contingent risk of creation, where all that alienates us from God and each other is addressed. Such an atonement is inherently inclusive of all people and is not one that is extended to disability as a special case. This approach to the atonement opens up space to address both the redemption of sin and the possibilities of spiritual and bodily healing. What McLachlan leads us to discover is that, when revisited in this way, the cross--perhaps surprisingly--becomes the cornerstone of Christian disability theology and the foundation of many of its arguments. Far from excluding those who find themselves physically or mentally outside of assumed norms, the atoning death of Christ creates a vital space of inclusion and affirmation for such persons within the life of the church. --Eleanor McLaughlin, Lecturer in Theology and Ethics, Regent's Park College, University of Oxford
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781481313674
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 225
Book Description
The atonement--where God in Jesus Christ addresses sin and the whole of the human predicament--lies at the heart of the Christian faith and life. Its saving power is for all people, and yet a deep hesitancy has prevented meaningful discussion of the cross' relevance for people with disabilities. Speaking of disability and the multifaceted concept of the atonement has created an unresolvable tension, not least because sin and disability often seem to be associated within the biblical text. While work in disability theology has made great progress in developing a positive theological framework for disability as an integral part of human diversity, it has so far fallen short of grappling with this particular set of interpretive challenges presented by the cross. In Accessible Atonement, reflecting on his experience as both a pastor and a theologian, David McLachlan brings the themes and objectives of disability theology into close conversation with traditional ideas of the cross as Jesus' sacrifice, justice, and victory. From this conversation emerges an account of the atonement as God's deepest, once-for-all participation in both the moral and contingent risk of creation, where all that alienates us from God and each other is addressed. Such an atonement is inherently inclusive of all people and is not one that is extended to disability as a special case. This approach to the atonement opens up space to address both the redemption of sin and the possibilities of spiritual and bodily healing. What McLachlan leads us to discover is that, when revisited in this way, the cross--perhaps surprisingly--becomes the cornerstone of Christian disability theology and the foundation of many of its arguments. Far from excluding those who find themselves physically or mentally outside of assumed norms, the atoning death of Christ creates a vital space of inclusion and affirmation for such persons within the life of the church. --Eleanor McLaughlin, Lecturer in Theology and Ethics, Regent's Park College, University of Oxford