From Inclusion to Belonging: Why ‘Disabled’ Bodies are Necessary for the Faithfulness of the Church

Abstract

A few years ago I and some colleagues at the Centre for Spirituality, Health, and Disability at the University of Aberdeen1 carried out a piece of research looking into the spiritual lives of people with intellectual disabilities.2 We were curious about what kinds of spiritual needs people with intellectual disabilities were articulating and the ways in which religious communities were responding. The findings were most interesting. Many people we talked with had active church lives and had encountered deep spiritual experiences. The responses of religious communities, however, were mixed. Some communities were fully engaged, creating welcoming spaces where people were offered meaningful hospitality and were genuinely integrated. Others were not so welcoming. Sometimes the problem was the theological beliefs of that community, which framed disability in particularly negative ways. If disability is considered to be a product of sin or the demonic, it is unlikely that people with disabilities will find much of a welcome. Sometimes the lack of welcome stemmed from the particular ways in which the church’s message was communicated and the intellectual requirements for participation. If one’s presence within a community, or indeed one’s salvation, is perceived to be dependent on one’s ability to understand and articulate complex statements of faith, then it will be difficult for a person with an intellectual disability to find a safe space. If a community assumes that God only speaks in words and that salvation requires certain oratory abilities and skills, it can be confusing to know how to frame those who can neither orate nor cognate in the ways demanded by the assumptions of that community.