Read the Church Times' article "Once we connect on to something, that’s it" on autism and Church, which features the Disability Advisory Group at St Martin-in-the-Fields with words from Fiona MacMillan.
The article says:
"There are estimated to be nearly a million people with a form of autism in the UK. It is likely that there are 80 in the average parish. Not all will be in church, but, like everyone else, they will be attending weddings, funerals, and other offices. Autism is not a mental-health condition, but a physical brain-wiring difference that, in the context of church worship, means, “Our brain wiring can literally overheat as it tries to handle too much input at once. We try very hard to avoid an overload of sensory or social situations.”
That explanation comes from the words of the C of E’s guidelines on autism, “Welcoming Those on the Autistic Spectrum”, which were created for Oxford diocese and formed part of the report Opening Doors, affirmed by the Synod in February.
[...]
Good practice can address all these things with what the guidelines say requires “nothing other than a bit of time and thought” — always in partnership with the people concerned. Fiona MacMillan chairs the Disability Advisory Group that works at St Martin-in-the-Fields, in London, which, in partnership with Inclusive Church, puts on an annual conference on disability and church. It is an opportunity to share learning and resources more widely, particularly evident in the booklet Calling From the Edge, launched at the General Synod in February.
“St Martin’s is a learning organisation,” she emphasises. “All our work is centred on lived experience: the experts are people who know, who encounter barriers and discrimination in daily life and in this place. We create change by understanding our different perspectives and working together to make things better.”
Whether characteristics associated with people with autism are perceived as positive or negative depends on context. “Understanding language literally is a challenge for those who don’t, but may encourage a clarity of thought which benefits all,” she reflects. “Wanting to know how things work doesn’t necessarily mean not appreciating mystery, or not being transfixed with wonder and delight at how things are.”
She lists among the characteristics of people with autism: “Honesty, integrity, directness, openness, creativity, different ways of perceiving, not being part of hierarchy and bureaucracy, not able to manipulate or discriminate. . . Loyalty, trust. Many autistic people have an inbuilt faith, unquestioning knowledge of the existence or presence of God.
“Having a passion for justice, spotting patterns, and noticing gaps or anomalies — including those who are left out or facing barriers to participation — are gospel values. Every church will have autistic people: some will have found their niche; others may not be open. It’s about acceptance of each other, openness to difference, acknowledging that one size doesn’t fit all, but we are all fearfully and wonderfully made in the image of God.”
Book a place to attend 'Something Worth Sharing', the 2018 conference on Disability and Church organised in partnership by Inclusive Church and St Martin-in-the-Field's, in October.
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Gungor - Beautiful Things.
Showing posts with label dag. Show all posts
Showing posts with label dag. Show all posts
Friday, 17 August 2018
Saturday, 14 July 2018
Thought for the Week: Healing and Wholeness
Here's my Thought for the Week at St Martin-in-the-Fields:
This weekend Ali Lyon and I are leading a session at the Parish Away Day entitled ‘Healing, Wholeness and Holiness: many branches: one vine?’
We are doing so on the basis that St Martin’s has many people involved in health and wholeness in its broadest sense. The session will draw on that rich diversity of experiences and perspectives to explore the holistic nature of healing ministry and how its many ‘branches’ connect to one vine. We hope that it will be a rich opportunity to learn more about God and about one another, and will continue to grow the understanding of healing and wholeness that has been developing at St Martin’s.
In the culture of Jesus’ time, disabled people - those with physical, sensory or mental health conditions, learning disability or neurodiversity - were actively excluded from the wider community and from worship at the Temple. Jesus’ healing ministry had the effect of re-including those who had been excluded in the wider community and in worship.
The key issue, however, was a culture which excluded others and which Jesus sought to address through his teaching about the Kingdom of God. Today, the best way to achieve this same aim within our society is by understanding and utilising the social model of disability, which recognises and seeks to dismantle the barriers to belonging that our society throws up through environment, structures and attitudes.
When we explore and address these barriers in church and society – as we seek to do through our Disability Advisory Group and our annual conference on disability and Church together with Inclusive Church – we are doing what Jesus sought to do through his healing ministry.
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James Taylor - Fire and Rain.
This weekend Ali Lyon and I are leading a session at the Parish Away Day entitled ‘Healing, Wholeness and Holiness: many branches: one vine?’
We are doing so on the basis that St Martin’s has many people involved in health and wholeness in its broadest sense. The session will draw on that rich diversity of experiences and perspectives to explore the holistic nature of healing ministry and how its many ‘branches’ connect to one vine. We hope that it will be a rich opportunity to learn more about God and about one another, and will continue to grow the understanding of healing and wholeness that has been developing at St Martin’s.
In the culture of Jesus’ time, disabled people - those with physical, sensory or mental health conditions, learning disability or neurodiversity - were actively excluded from the wider community and from worship at the Temple. Jesus’ healing ministry had the effect of re-including those who had been excluded in the wider community and in worship.
The key issue, however, was a culture which excluded others and which Jesus sought to address through his teaching about the Kingdom of God. Today, the best way to achieve this same aim within our society is by understanding and utilising the social model of disability, which recognises and seeks to dismantle the barriers to belonging that our society throws up through environment, structures and attitudes.
When we explore and address these barriers in church and society – as we seek to do through our Disability Advisory Group and our annual conference on disability and Church together with Inclusive Church – we are doing what Jesus sought to do through his healing ministry.
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James Taylor - Fire and Rain.
Thursday, 7 September 2017
Disability and inclusion
Here is the sermon I preached at today's lunchtime Eucharist at St Stephen Walbrook:
‘In the early 1980s, after decades of steady deterioration, writer and academic John Hull lost his sight.’ As he adjusted to his new condition, he ‘came to think of blindness as one of the great natural human conditions.’ It is, he wrote, ‘just the way that some people are, and the world which blindness creates is one of the many human worlds, which must all be put together if the human experience is to become entire.’ In fact, ‘to believe in the God of all being who is Lord of all life’ means ‘we have to put the worlds together’ because ‘we need each other.’
In today’s Gospel reading (Mark 7. 31 - 37), we see Jesus enter into the world of a deaf man who also had an impediment in his speech. Jesus understands this man’s communication issues and responds to him in ways which aim to minimise his distress and maximise their ability to communicate. Jesus realises that being in a crowd would have been disorientating for this man, so takes him away from the crowd in order that they can communicate one-to-one. Then, he uses the heightened senses that this man possesses - sight and touch – in order to communicate with him. As a hearing person with speech, Jesus could have stayed in his world and sought to use words to communicate. Instead, he uses touch primarily and sight secondarily to mark the places to be unblocked and opened.
Jesus sometimes asks those he heals, ‘Do you want to get well?’ This may seem a surprising question, yet if disabilities, such as blindness or deafness, do create their own worlds, then there is a choice to be made about which world to inhabit. John Hull discovered great insights through entering the world of blindness, so it may be that when Jesus takes this man aside that he asks him which world he wishes to inhabit. On many occasions when Jesus heals, the result of his healing is that the person healed is re-included into society generally and the local community. In Jesus’ time, many disabled people were excluded from the Temple and forced to exist on the edge of society. Following many of his healings, Jesus sends the healed person to the priest in order that the person can be re-integrated into society. Today, we realise that instead of needing to change the person in order to be inclusive, rather we need to change society, both attitudinally and physically.
Fiona MacMillan chairs the Disability Advisory Group at St Martin-in-the-Fields. She says: ‘Historically the church has been amazing at caring for people on the edge of society. For hundreds of years the church challenged, led and changed society through its valuing of those who are powerless. It practiced faith in action by feeding, housing and caring for people who otherwise would have suffered or died through poverty or sickness.
But since the 1960s the disability rights movement has campaigned for greater autonomy, and the Church has been slower than society to respond to what is a significant sector of the population. In the UK today there are about 11 million people with living with a disabling physical, sensory, cognitive or mental health condition, of whom 80% were born healthy and have had to learn to adjust. All of us spend our lives somewhere on a spectrum between the super-fit athlete and the profoundly impaired person, moving and changing as a result of accident, illness or ageing. Disabled people may be an uncomfortable presence in a society lauding strength, but in the Church which professes a paradox of vulnerability we're often objects for pastoral attention rather than agents of change.
The Church of the 21st century frequently fails disabled people, hearing echoes of an understanding that links sickness with sinfulness, mental health issues with possession, and disability as being in need of cure. Pounced on by street pastors, spoken about rather than listened to, regarded as difficult or demanding, costly or time-consuming, it's not surprising that many disabled people are put off going to church – even if we can get in. Access is often focused on getting in rather than joining in – ramps and lifts, hearing loops and loos – with participation seen as a step too far. We are more likely to be known by our needs than celebrated for our gifts.’
Fiona is arguing that, while the Church has at times been effective in offering healing and care, it hasn’t been anywhere near as effective in terms of inclusion, which was the overall aim of Jesus’ healing ministry. We need to do more, as the Church, to put our different worlds together and, as Jesus did, to enter the world of disabled people and then receive the gifts found in those worlds. As John Hull stated, ‘We have to put the worlds together’ because ‘we need each other.’
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Edward Elgar - Lux Aeterna.
‘In the early 1980s, after decades of steady deterioration, writer and academic John Hull lost his sight.’ As he adjusted to his new condition, he ‘came to think of blindness as one of the great natural human conditions.’ It is, he wrote, ‘just the way that some people are, and the world which blindness creates is one of the many human worlds, which must all be put together if the human experience is to become entire.’ In fact, ‘to believe in the God of all being who is Lord of all life’ means ‘we have to put the worlds together’ because ‘we need each other.’
In today’s Gospel reading (Mark 7. 31 - 37), we see Jesus enter into the world of a deaf man who also had an impediment in his speech. Jesus understands this man’s communication issues and responds to him in ways which aim to minimise his distress and maximise their ability to communicate. Jesus realises that being in a crowd would have been disorientating for this man, so takes him away from the crowd in order that they can communicate one-to-one. Then, he uses the heightened senses that this man possesses - sight and touch – in order to communicate with him. As a hearing person with speech, Jesus could have stayed in his world and sought to use words to communicate. Instead, he uses touch primarily and sight secondarily to mark the places to be unblocked and opened.
Jesus sometimes asks those he heals, ‘Do you want to get well?’ This may seem a surprising question, yet if disabilities, such as blindness or deafness, do create their own worlds, then there is a choice to be made about which world to inhabit. John Hull discovered great insights through entering the world of blindness, so it may be that when Jesus takes this man aside that he asks him which world he wishes to inhabit. On many occasions when Jesus heals, the result of his healing is that the person healed is re-included into society generally and the local community. In Jesus’ time, many disabled people were excluded from the Temple and forced to exist on the edge of society. Following many of his healings, Jesus sends the healed person to the priest in order that the person can be re-integrated into society. Today, we realise that instead of needing to change the person in order to be inclusive, rather we need to change society, both attitudinally and physically.
Fiona MacMillan chairs the Disability Advisory Group at St Martin-in-the-Fields. She says: ‘Historically the church has been amazing at caring for people on the edge of society. For hundreds of years the church challenged, led and changed society through its valuing of those who are powerless. It practiced faith in action by feeding, housing and caring for people who otherwise would have suffered or died through poverty or sickness.
But since the 1960s the disability rights movement has campaigned for greater autonomy, and the Church has been slower than society to respond to what is a significant sector of the population. In the UK today there are about 11 million people with living with a disabling physical, sensory, cognitive or mental health condition, of whom 80% were born healthy and have had to learn to adjust. All of us spend our lives somewhere on a spectrum between the super-fit athlete and the profoundly impaired person, moving and changing as a result of accident, illness or ageing. Disabled people may be an uncomfortable presence in a society lauding strength, but in the Church which professes a paradox of vulnerability we're often objects for pastoral attention rather than agents of change.
The Church of the 21st century frequently fails disabled people, hearing echoes of an understanding that links sickness with sinfulness, mental health issues with possession, and disability as being in need of cure. Pounced on by street pastors, spoken about rather than listened to, regarded as difficult or demanding, costly or time-consuming, it's not surprising that many disabled people are put off going to church – even if we can get in. Access is often focused on getting in rather than joining in – ramps and lifts, hearing loops and loos – with participation seen as a step too far. We are more likely to be known by our needs than celebrated for our gifts.’
Fiona is arguing that, while the Church has at times been effective in offering healing and care, it hasn’t been anywhere near as effective in terms of inclusion, which was the overall aim of Jesus’ healing ministry. We need to do more, as the Church, to put our different worlds together and, as Jesus did, to enter the world of disabled people and then receive the gifts found in those worlds. As John Hull stated, ‘We have to put the worlds together’ because ‘we need each other.’
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Edward Elgar - Lux Aeterna.
Sunday, 16 July 2017
Worth Abbey: At the Heart, On the Edge.
It was wonderful to be back at Worth Abbey and to be there together with so many from the St Martin's community. Our Education Committee had organised a particularly full and varied programme.
The weekend as a whole was wonderful but highlights for me included insights from: Jane Williams on truthful prayer in the Psalms that enable us to anger and concern; Neil McGregor exploring our human need to share the sacred by expressing what is beyond our grasp; our Disability Advisory Group speaking from lived experience about reclaiming the healing miracles in the Gospels; a Theology Group that began by reflecting on reasons why the central act in human history occurred on the edge of Empire and influence; our Choir singing Allegri's Miserere in the resonant acoustic of the Abbey church with reflections from Sam Wells; and a special closing Eucharist drawing all our activities and reflections together.
I gave an update on HeartEdge, the growing ecumenical network of churches and other organisations working across the UK and overseas initiated by St Martin's. Tim Bissett did the same in relation to the Frontline Network, which equips and supports those on the front line working with homeless and vulnerably housed people.
In addition there was also time for socialising, games, children's activities, walks, an art activity, a film, Tai Chi session, a tour of the Abbey and worship both with our community and with the monks. The art activity, led by Andrew and Helen Carter and Alice Bree, created a wall hanging depicting swallows darting to the centre of two large circles, as well as also being on the edge.
Phyllis Santa-Maria was one of those who came. She reflected: 'Wonderful St Martin-in-the-Fields Parish weekend at Worth Abbey, East Sussex. It's my fourth one, done biennially, and hard to believe each one is better than the last. Our theme, 'At the heart. On the edge.' focused on how we as a church in the heart of London and being with people on the edges of society and the economic mainstream can deepen our commitment to ourselves and our communities for making the world a better place. We prayed, learned from each other and guests, had a great, stimulating time.'
Since I last visited Worth Abbey the monks have commissioned Heatherwick Studio to design and develop a furniture strategy as part of wider renovations to the Abbey church. The furniture package included pew benches, choir stalls with misericord seats and desks, benches, credence tables, server seats and reconciliation (confessional) rooms. Heatherwick has embedded curved threads of ash into the dark walnut pews.
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Gregorio Allegri - Missa Vidi Turbam Magnam.
Thursday, 8 October 2015
Living on the Edge
How do we respond when we find ourselves excluded? A day at St Martin-in-the-Fields exploring how disabled people are finding new ways to use their experience of exclusion to improve understanding and address barriers to belonging. Through talks and workshops, using the art space, silent space and marketplace, this is an opportunity organised by and for disabled people, supporters and people with an interest in the issues to gather and resource each other and the church.
Speakers include: Ann Memmott – national autism advisor; Eva McIntyre – Mental Health Matters; the Disability Advisory Group, St Martin’s; WAVE; Disability & Jesus; and Sam Wells.
This event will take place in St Martin’s Hall.
Register online at http://www.inclusive-church.org/disability-conference-2015 or by post to: Living on the Edge, 4 Ferney, Dursley, Gloucestershire GL11 5AB
Cost: £20 | £10 concessions
Phone: 020 7766 1100
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Iona - Edge Of The World.
Friday, 7 August 2015
Living on the Edge and Living with Dementia
St Martin-in-the-Fields partners Inclusive Church to offer an annual conference on the subject of disability and church. This year's conference is entitled 'Living on the Edge' and will be held in the St Martin's Hall on Saturday 17th October 2015 (10.30am - 4.30pm).
How do we respond when we find ourselves excluded? A day exploring how disabled people are finding new ways to use their experience of exclusion to improve understanding and address barriers to belonging. Through talks and workshops, using the art space, silent space and marketplace, this is an opportunity organised by and for disabled people, supporters and people with an interest in the issues to gather and resource each other and the church.
Speakers include: Ann Memmott – national autism advisor; Eva McIntyre – Mental Health Matters; the Disability Advisory Group, St Martin’s; WAVE; Disability & Jesus; and Sam Wells.
Cost: £20 | £10 concessions
/stmartininthefields @smitf_london St Martin-in-the-Fields, Trafalgar Square, London, WC2N 4JJ Phone: 020 7766 1100 Online: www.smitf.org
Register at www.inclusive-church.org/disability-conference-2015 or by post to: Living on the Edge, 4 Ferney, Dursley, Gloucestershire GL11 5AB
St Martin's is also continuing to explore the experience of dementia and faith, through the insight of lived experience and theological reflection, as we look at how our church life and worship might grow in a more dementia-friendly way. This 'Living with Dementia' event will take place in St Martin’s Hall on September 15, 2015 at 7:00 pm. All are welcome.
These initiatives stem from work which is now taken forward by the Disability Advisory Group (DAG). The DAG draws together people with insight or interest in this work arising
from their own lived experience of long-term illness, physical or sensory impairment or mental health
issues; or from a support, caring or professional role (paid or unpaid). Open meetings once a term,
use the gathered expertise to inform and guide work on disability, with a particular focus or
topic relating to issues of disability, inclusion and faith.
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Evelyn Glennie - A Little Prayer.
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Evelyn Glennie - A Little Prayer.
Thursday, 18 June 2015
Prayer: There is a crack in everything
Here is a prayer that I wrote for a recent Bread for the World service at St Martin-in-the-Fields which was prepared by the Disability Advisory Group. The prayer is based on both 2 Corinthians 4. 5 - 14 and Leonard Cohen's 'Anthem':
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Leonard Cohen - Anthem.
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