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A Movement of Lay Professionals

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Title: A Movement of Lay Professionals


1
A Movement of Lay Professionals
  • Jeff McNair Ph.D.
  • California Baptist University
  • President, National Association of Christians in
    Special Education

2
Social Constructions of Disability
  • The social construction of disability is based
    on the theory of social construction, which
    asserts that meaning is created, learned and
    shared by people. Created meaning is then
    reflected in the behaviors, objects, and language
    used by people
  • (Bogdan Biklen, 1977)

3
Social Constructionist vs. Social Creationist
(Oliver, 1990)
  • Social constructionist view of disability views
    the problem as being located in the minds of
    able-bodied people. Through the manifestation of
    hostile social attitudes and the enactment of
    social policies based upon a tragic view of
    disability.
  • Social creationist view sees the problem as
    located within the institutionalized practices of
    society.
  • Arguably, within the Church we struggle with
  • both types of social constructions

4
Social Constructions of Disability
  • Obstacles to inclusion of people with
    disabilities in community life are not based
    solely on the persons functional limitations,
    but rather on societys response to people with
    disabilities people with disabilities have
    experienced constructed obstacles leading to a
    lack of inclusion. . . (Devine, 1997)

5
Social Constructions of Disability
  • Obstacles to inclusion of people with
    disabilities in community life are not based
    solely on the persons functional limitations,
    but rather on societys response to people with
    disabilities people with disabilities have
    experienced constructed obstacles leading to a
    lack of inclusion... (Devine, 1997)
  • In most developed societies it is now widely
    recognized that the severe economic and social
    deprivations encountered by disabled people
    cannot be explained simply with reference to
    individually based functional limitations
    (Barnes, 1995)

6
Social Constructions of Disability
  • Obstacles to inclusion of people with
    disabilities in community life are not based
    solely on the persons functional limitations,
    but rather on societys response to people with
    disabilities people with disabilities have
    experienced constructed obstacles leading to a
    lack of inclusion... (Devine, 1997)
  • In most developed societies it is now widely
    recognized that the severe economic and social
    deprivations encountered by disabled people
    cannot be explained simply with reference to
    individually based functional limitations
    (Barnes, 1995)
  • Disability is then a form of social
    disadvantage, which is imposed on top of
    physiological impairment (Tremain, 2002)

7
Social Constructions of Disability
  • Obstacles to inclusion of people with
    disabilities in community life are not based
    solely on the persons functional limitations,
    but rather on societys response to people with
    disabilities people with disabilities have
    experienced constructed obstacles leading to a
    lack of inclusion... (Devine, 1997)
  • In most developed societies it is now widely
    recognized that the severe economic and social
    deprivations encountered by disabled people
    cannot be explained simply with reference to
    individually based functional limitations
    (Barnes, 1995)
  • Disability is then a form of social
    disadvantage, which is imposed on top of
    physiological impairment (Tremain, 2002)
  • They also see themselves as pitiful because they
    are socialized into accepting disability as a
    tragedy personal to themselves (Oliver, 1990)

8
Social Constructions of Disability
  • Obstacles to inclusion of people with
    disabilities in community life are not based
    solely on the persons functional limitations,
    but rather on societys response to people with
    disabilities people with disabilities have
    experienced constructed obstacles leading to a
    lack of inclusion... (Devine, 1997)
  • In most developed societies it is now widely
    recognized that the severe economic and social
    deprivations encountered by disabled people
    cannot be explained simply with reference to
    individually based functional limitations
    (Barnes, 1995)
  • Disability is then a form of social
    disadvantage, which is imposed on top of
    physiological impairment (Tremain, 2002)
  • They also see themselves as pitiful because they
    are socialized into accepting disability as a
    tragedy personal to themselves (Oliver, 1990)
  • Disability becomes the primary basis of
    identification, one which mutes other
    characteristics (Fritsch, 2004)

9
Return-on-investment (Snell and Brown, 2006)
  • The return-on-investment value orientation is
    based on a curative mentality that sends negative
    messages to children with disabilities and their
    families. Imagine what it might be like to
    continually get the message, "You are not OK the
    way your are. In order to be OK, your disability
    has to be fixed and you need to be more like us
    (people without disabilities)."

10
Return-on-investment (Snell and Brown, 2006)
  • The return-on-investment value orientation is
    based on a curative mentality that sends negative
    messages to children with disabilities and their
    families. Imagine what it might be like to
    continually get the message, "You are not OK the
    way your are. In order to be OK, your disability
    has to be fixed and you need to be more like us
    (people without disabilities)."
  • Increasingly, self-advocates are asking that
    their disabilities be viewed as a form of natural
    human diversity and that others' efforts be less
    about "fixing" a person's disabilities and more
    about accepting individuals for who they are and
    providing necessary and self-determined supports.

11
Return-on-investment (Snell and Brown, 2006)
  • The return-on-investment value orientation is
    based on a curative mentality that sends negative
    messages to children with disabilities and their
    families. Imagine what it might be like to
    continually get the message, "You are not OK the
    way your are. In order to be OK, your disability
    has to be fixed and you need to be more like us
    (people without disabilities)."
  • Increasingly, self-advocates are asking that
    their disabilities be viewed as a form of natural
    human diversity and that others' efforts be less
    about "fixing" a person's disabilities and more
    about accepting individuals for who they are and
    providing necessary and self-determined supports.
  • In addition, the return-on-investment approach
    tends to discriminate against individuals with
    the most severe disabilities. It seeks to justify
    the differential valuing of people and the
    services they receive on the basis of the
    severity of their disability characteristics.
    Anytime schools sanction practices that imply
    that some students are more worthy of staff time
    and resources than other students, there is a
    serious problem. All children are worthy,
    although they have differing needs.
  • But even if we were to select some people over
    others, who would God choose?

12
Return on investmentWho would God choose?
  • But God chose the foolish things of the world to
    shame the wise God chose the weak things of the
    world to shame the strong. He chose the lowly
    things of this world and the despised things -
    and the things that are not - to nullify the
    things that are, so that no one may boast before
    him. (1 Corinthians 1 27-29)
  • Listen my dear brothers Has not God chosen those
    who are poor in the eyes of the world to be rich
    in faith and to inherit the kingdom promised
    those who love him? But you have insulted the
    poorIf you really keep the royal law found in
    Scripture, Love your neighbor as yourself, you
    are doing right. But if you show favoritism, you
    sin and are convicted by the law as law breakers.
    (James 2 5-9)
  • Even Friedrich Nietzsche noted in The Antichrist,
  • Christianity has taken the part of all the the
    weak, the low, the botched
  • THE CHURCH IS DISOBEDIENT

13
Christian Social Constructions of Disability
  • Part of the answer is undoubtedly that these
    ideologies are so deeply embedded in social
    consciousness generally that they become facts
    they are naturalized. Thus everyone knows that
    disability is a personal tragedy for individuals
    so affected hence ideology becomes common
    sense. (Oliver, 1990)

14
We need lay professionals to confront
  • Common sense based barriers to efforts to
    include persons with disabilities in the local
    church have resulted from
  • An ignorance of who people with disability
    actually are
  • In spite of Jesus interactions with persons with
    disability
  • The 20 of the population who are disabled
  • Congregational members with children with
    disabilities

15
We need lay professionals to confront
  • Common sense based barriers to efforts to
    include persons with disabilities in the local
    church have resulted from
  • An ignorance of who people with disability
    actually are
  • In spite of Jesus interactions with persons with
    disability
  • The 20 of the population who are disabled
  • Congregational members with children with
    disabilities
  • Imagined perceptions of who people with
    disability are
  • Disability is the result of sin (either
    individually or the Fall)
  • Devil or angel mindsets
  • People with disabilities are somehow different

16
We need lay professionals to confront
  • Common sense based barriers to efforts to
    include persons with disabilities in the local
    church have resulted from
  • An ignorance of who people with disability
    actually are
  • In spite of Jesus interactions with persons with
    disability
  • The 20 of the population who are disabled
  • Congregational members with children with
    disabilities
  • Imagined perceptions of who people with
    disability are
  • Disability is the result of sin (either
    individually or the Fall)
  • Devil or angel mindsets
  • People with disabilities are somehow different
  • Imagined ideas of what a ministry involves or
    what is required to engage persons with
    disabilities
  • The ministry will cost too much
  • The ministry will take too much time
  • Workers in the ministry need a great deal of
    training
  • They will drive other members of the congregation
    away
  • We can choose to not serve people with
    disabilities

17
We need lay professionals
  • who
  • challenge society to reconceptualize the way we
    think about disability and the person with the
    disability. (Devine, 1997)
  • We need to challenge the Church!

18
  • How would we conceptualize a Biblically based,
    Christian construction of disability?
  • How would that construction look in the Church?
  • Who has the knowledge and experience to
    facilitate the development of change in the way
    the Church sees all people, including people with
    disability?

19
One Biblical example
  • John 93-5 (NIV) says,
  • "Neither this man or his parents sinned" said
    Jesus, "but this happened so that the work of God
    might be displayed in his life. As long as it is
    day, we must do the work of him who sent me.
    Night is coming when no one can work.
  • Merril C. Tenney, the Bible scholar wrote that
    this passage might be translated in a different
    way. Here is Tenney's translation.
  • "Neither did this man sin, nor his parents" said
    Jesus. "But that the works of God should be made
    manifest in him, we must work the works of him
    that sent me, while it is still day the night
    cometh when no man can work.

20
A Biblical mandate
  • Luke 1248 (NIV)
  • From everyone who has been given much, much
    will be demanded and from the one who has been
    entrusted with much, much more will be asked.
  • Who should we expect to be the ones
    facilitating/developing ministry to persons with
    disability if not the Christian professionals in
    the field of disability?
  • The Church hasnt done it, pastors havent done
    it but who in the Church really has the
    knowledge and experience to change the Church,
    that the works of God should be made manifest?
    The answer is in the same passage. We, the lay
    professionals, must work the works of him that
    sent me, while it is still day the night cometh
    when no man can work.

21
NO EXCUSES
  • Why would I not offer my best, the skill I have
    studied and been trained in, the work that I
    spend most of my time doing, the years of
    experience I have, the vocation I am committed
    to?
  • Please dont tell your Lord
  • Thats my job, I need a break on weekends
  • I am not allowed to fraternize with clients
  • Separation of Church and State
  • I am too busy, I dont have the time
  • I separate my work life from my spiritual life
  • Fill in your favorite excuse, but dont try it!
  • If you dont do it, who do you expect will?

22
We need lay professionals
  • Too often weve heard from the pulpit of a
    church
  • We are all equal in Gods sight
  • God loves us all the same
  • We are all the same at the foot of the cross
  • You fill in the blank
  • But then you look around the Church for the 19
    of the population that the US Census Bureau says
    are disabledwhere are they?
  • These people honor me with their lips, but their
    hearts are far from me (Matthew 158)

23
We need lay professionals
  • To bring people with disabilities into the Church
    because the leadership and the institutions of
    the Church are not inviting them in to the degree
    they should.
  • If ministry is not a priority, it will become one
    as we begin to invite and include persons with
    disability in our churches.
  • Teach this phrase
  • I have a disability and I know your Bible. Now
    where do you want me to sit?

24
We need lay professionals
  • Professionals who realize that
  • the Church desperately needs to offer social
    integration
  • to be obedient
  • the State is desperately seeking social
    integration
  • to best serve clients
  • disabled persons desperately want social
    integration
  • to develop relationships

25
The degree to which the Churchs structures do
not include persons with disability, is the
degree to which we live in disobedience within
the church.This is our call for this time.
26
Thank you for your attention!
  • For more information, go to
  • http//jeffmcnair.com
  • or
  • http//nacsped.com
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