Someone told my friend, who has Crohn's disease, that sick and disabled people were "not made in the image of God" and "not fully human". He believed that disabled people should be exiled from their communities and left to die. Other Christians told her that she should pray to get better, or that her sickness was God's will. As an atheist, I believe that disabled people should get the evidence-based treatment and accomodations they need, and that they shouldn't be stigmatized. Thoughts?
cw ableism, violent ableism
I am outraged to hear what people have been telling your friend. My stomach is roiling just thinking about it. I’m so glad she’s got a friend like you to tell her otherwise.
Sick and disabled people are made in God’s image; we are fully human; we are a vital and worthy part of our communities.
All human beings deserve to exist and to have access to abundant life – it doesn’t matter whether we fit into what society considers “productive,” it doesn’t matter what support we need.
I don’t know if this is annoying to share or if could be helpful for your friend, but when I was a chaplain this past fall i would do “rounds” in the hospital, basically just dropping in on as many patients as i could. one patient i stopped by to see turned out to be a guy with Crohn’s disease.
he was super friendly, and he joked a lot. He called me “reverend,” which made me laugh – even after I told him I wasn’t ordained yet, he told me that if i one day would be, than he could call me reverend now!
he said he didn’t understand why God would make him sick, and we delved into that a little bit. my job as a chaplain isn’t to feed patients my answers to their questions, but to help them discover what they believe. as we talked, what he came up with is that God could use his illness to show everyone that the ones we call “weak” have plenty to give the world.
he proceeded to pull out his laptop and show me songs he’d composed in garage band. he’s published them and even does tours! but i can’t remember his name, so i’ve never been able to find his work again. it honestly wasn’t my cup of tea anyway, but i remember him telling me the album he was working on now would be called “God is a She.” (or something like that, i can’t remember exactly!) and would be about women who have inspired him throughout his life. i thought that was super cool and evidence of some deep theological wisdom in this man.
so if your friend needs examples of people of faith who have Crohn’s disease, people who have Crohn’s and are living creative, happy lives – here’s one example of such a person.
I’ve got some resources that you or your friend might find useful:
The first is non-religious-specific – a post about how we don’t need to be “useful” or “productive” to be beloved and important members of society; it’s got links to lots of articles about prehistoric people with disabilities!
I’ve written a paper that sums up the ideas of various disability theologians about how disabled people are a vital part of the Body of Christ and how it is urgent that we work to include them more fully in our churches
For the people who tell her to pray for a cure!! I offer this quote!!
For the statement that her illness is “God’s will,” I recommend my sermon on John 9, when Jesus’s disciples asked him “who sinned” for a man to be born blind. We find that disabilities and illnesses are not punishments; disabled people are not “lessons,” not objects for other people’s inspiration porn. These things just happen, and while it’s 100% valid for disabled persons to seek out and find meaning or value in their disability if they want, none are obligated to do so. God can work with anything that happens, good or bad, but that doesn’t mean God wills the messier or harder parts of disability (things like chronic pain and ableism).
I’ve also preached on how Jesus rose from the dead with disabling wounds – that the Body of Christ is disabled.
Here’s a story of a disabled woman who recognized that God had a special calling for her not in spite of but in many ways because of her disability.
Finally, I actually just created a google doc for resources on disability for Christians!! Scroll to the last two pages for Christian-specific resources, including the books on disability that I used for the paper I linked earlier.
You might also find useful stuff in my #disability theology tag.
The God whom we encounter in the Bible – both the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament) and the Greek (New Testament) – is a God of the oppressed. A God who gives special love and attention to the people whom our societies shun to the margins. A God who promises to lift up the lowly and bring us all into abundant life.
God is always, always at the margins. Disabled persons have been shoved to the margins in our communities – and therefore, God is with disabled persons. If we were to exile disabled persons from our communities, we would be exiling God. God would go with them.
Sorry this got long, but I have a lot of feelings on this topic. I will close with this passage from 1 Corinthians 12:
“There are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit; and diversities of vocations, but the same Lord; and there are diversities of workings, but the same God is working all in all. …For just as the body is one and has many members, but all the members of the body, being many, are one body, so also Christ. …And the eye cannot say to the hand, “I have no need of you”; nor again the head to the feet, “I have no need of you!” On the contrary, those parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable. …And if one member suffers, all the members suffer with it; if a member is given honor, all the members rejoice together.”
The human race is one body, a body that needs each and every member. We are all interdependent, and that is a beautiful thing.
I hope this helps, anon. Your friend has the right to love and accommodations, not hate and exclusion. And she is deeply loved by God.
