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You know, even back in my youth and childhood, when, if asked what my religion was, I'd answer "Christian," my family was not much for reading the Bible, or going to Church, or anything like that.
So while I was aware of many Christians' attitudes toward the disabled (because if I were out in public often or long enough someone would eventually tell me they'd pray for me, or say: "God bless you!" when I hadn't sneezed), I was never witness to the full range of social and symbolic meanings that Christains often give to disability.
So, last week, when I was searching for definitions of "Ablism and "Disablism," and came upon this webpage, I read it with great interest, since it's what appears to be from one Evangelical Christian to other Evangelical Christians:
Jesus and the paralytic, the blind and the lame: A Sermon, by Josie Byzek (2000).
My emotional responses to it are mixed (of course, it's only been jostling around in my head for a week). I think it's a good starting point, and it gives me more vocabulary should I ever find myself in conversation with someone who speaks the Jesus language. And, of course, being a Believer, Ms. Byzek can't criticize the man Jesus's actions or words, since the man Jesus was also the God Jesus, she can only offer a reinterpretation of the stories about him. But it still feels a little creepy in my belly when the only way, in the Bible stories, for Jesus to end oppression against the disabled in Jerusalem was to cure them of their disabilities. That's a bit like ending racism by "curing" people of their color, or ending sexism by making everyone a man.
Yes, yes... I know I have to take context of the time and place and culture into account. But still. Jesus may have not had the ethical freedom to magically remove bigotry. But maybe Josie Byzek could have been clearer on that point. I don't know. You are always limited by the fact that you have to meet your audience halfway. And I was never in her audience. So.
Also a GIP.
It's a variation of the "punchline" to that other dream I wrote about for BADD. ... I consider in Beta, now. I may change the wording to "I don't want a medal!" and put a picture in it. Maybe. Anyway: the colors in the icon were the prevailing colors of the dream -- a lot of broken down rusty metal and concrete and dingy back alleys...
So while I was aware of many Christians' attitudes toward the disabled (because if I were out in public often or long enough someone would eventually tell me they'd pray for me, or say: "God bless you!" when I hadn't sneezed), I was never witness to the full range of social and symbolic meanings that Christains often give to disability.
So, last week, when I was searching for definitions of "Ablism and "Disablism," and came upon this webpage, I read it with great interest, since it's what appears to be from one Evangelical Christian to other Evangelical Christians:
Jesus and the paralytic, the blind and the lame: A Sermon, by Josie Byzek (2000).
My emotional responses to it are mixed (of course, it's only been jostling around in my head for a week). I think it's a good starting point, and it gives me more vocabulary should I ever find myself in conversation with someone who speaks the Jesus language. And, of course, being a Believer, Ms. Byzek can't criticize the man Jesus's actions or words, since the man Jesus was also the God Jesus, she can only offer a reinterpretation of the stories about him. But it still feels a little creepy in my belly when the only way, in the Bible stories, for Jesus to end oppression against the disabled in Jerusalem was to cure them of their disabilities. That's a bit like ending racism by "curing" people of their color, or ending sexism by making everyone a man.
Yes, yes... I know I have to take context of the time and place and culture into account. But still. Jesus may have not had the ethical freedom to magically remove bigotry. But maybe Josie Byzek could have been clearer on that point. I don't know. You are always limited by the fact that you have to meet your audience halfway. And I was never in her audience. So.
Also a GIP.
It's a variation of the "punchline" to that other dream I wrote about for BADD. ... I consider in Beta, now. I may change the wording to "I don't want a medal!" and put a picture in it. Maybe. Anyway: the colors in the icon were the prevailing colors of the dream -- a lot of broken down rusty metal and concrete and dingy back alleys...
