This last week I had the privilege of hanging out with two of my favorite people for a few days in Calgary. We went to a movie, almost died on a hike, ate good food, talked theology, and stayed up way too late but above all, I experienced the intangible, a deep ecclesiology. In other words, I experienced deep church.
So to all my friends…thanks for being you and walking through life with me and allowing me the privilege of walking along side of you.
I found this great app on The Simpsons Movie site that allows you to create Simpsons characters that resemble you. I did one for each of our family and put them together as one image – this is the picture I ended up with.
It has been a while since I have posted. I have some intelligent blog posts in the making but for now I thought I should just give you a quick update on my life:
reviews for including: “Technopoly,” “Politics of Meaning,” “Good to Great,” “Courageous Leadership” and I’m sure I’ve forgotten some others.
Die Hard” and “Transformers.” On the bad side, I’ve seen “The Contractor.” There are many in betweens but “The Contractor” (staring Wesley Snipes – yes, he is still making movies) is so bad that nothing in recent memory even comes close.
I came across the word “triskaidekaphobia” and though it would be fun to use it as many times as I could today given it is Friday the 13th. I don’t suffer from “triskaidekaphobia” and don’t really know of others who do, I just think it is a fun word and maybe for a day I’ll sound smart…
Laurie (my wife) and I had the opportunity to attend a five-weekend leadership retreat centering on advocacy for children with disabilities. Although there is much to say about the experience, I wanted to share a thought expressed by one of our speakers that I am still working through and thinking on. It is an argument and discussion point that I hadn’t heard before but one I found extremely compelling.
We were discussing the growing acknowledgment in our society, on different levels, to the need, benefit and health of including people with disabilities into every aspect of our society. Although there are many different definitions of “inclusion” and what it means, the base principle applies to each: that each human being, regardless of their ability, potential or limitations, should be provided equal opportunity to be included in our society on every level. I am becoming more and more aware of how, as a society, and frankly even as the Church, we haven’t embraced this principle and in fact, by our words and actions, devalue people of different abilities – but that is a post for a different day.
The argument the speaker presented was kind of an aside in the presentation but struck home with me as an incongruent piece of a changing societal norm. In a culture that is, on the whole, positively progressing in how it treats people with disabilities and including them more and more areas of societal life, there is one aspect that seems strangely counter-progressive. In this increasingly inclusive world, we concomitantly see a health system and growing ethical system that has embraced the practice of encouraging and performing abortions for those families who, in their prenatal care, are discovered to be carrying a child with some diagnosed disability. The reason often presented is that having a child with a disability would be a to great a burden on the family, the person who has the disability and of course our economically struggling health system to carry the baby to term. However, if, as a culture, we are progressively embracing inclusion of people with disabilities in our schools, workplaces, community areas and churches, wouldn’t it seem like the place inclusion should begin is the equal right to be included in birth.
It is an unjust paradox that a culture would positively shift to the see people with disabilities through their potential, and concurrently not see their right to live or even suggest/lobby for/argue for their prenatal death.
As a parent of a child with a disability who is actively trying to change culture so that it sees our son for his potential rather than his limitations (as we would all like to see seen), the infuriating irony is that individuals, like our son, are increasingly welcomed in schools, community events but sadly and despairingly, not into life outside the womb as doctors and health care professionals encourage parents to abort their children because of their potential and perceived overwhelming burden.
This can’t be right and I, for one, am committed to changing our society.
