Intellectual Disability and Holy Communion: The Peace that Passes Understanding

Abstract

This article details and analyzes a service of Holy Communion in which most participants have some form of intellectual disability. The context in which the worship is experienced is examined. Critical reflection on the service, and those participating in it, is used to address the issue of what the celebrating of this sacrament has to say about the relationship these people have with God, and how they seek to live their lives. Discussion also centers on what this experience of worship has to say to the wider Christian community. In exploring these issues it is contended that these people derive meaning from this worship experience with the use of faculties beyond the cerebral, and experience a God beyond intellectual understanding who accepts them as they are. Through the freely given act of grace ritually expressed in the Communion service the recipients of the host are seen as people who, though restrained by the medicalized environment in which they live, experience freedom from restraint within the sacramental context. Ecumenical and non-cerebral issues are raised in regard to the wider Christian community, as is the embracing nature of God's love for humankind.