Throughout history we have developed special terms for persons with disabilities such as "retarded", "different", DISabled, limp, lame, and even "imperfect" or "unclean". This is just a small example of all the words one could come up with. A youth group I worked with came up with a list of over 50 different terms for persons with disabilities. I am reading Unexpected Guests at God's Banquet: Welcoming People with Disabilities into the Church by Brett Webb-Mitchell. Yes, this book does reflect upon the Christian tradition. However, I encourage people of other faiths to also read this book because it addresses similar issues that can be applied in other faith traditions. Starting in the first chapter it reflects upon how the language for persons with disabilities says a lot in the way we treat, socialize, and minister to people.
Throughout history parents who gave birth to a child with a disability would do one of three things; keep them in their home hidden and deny their existence, abandon them, or have them killed. It was the belief for many that the disabilities were contagious or that these children were corrupted by the devil. The Holocaust was an unbelievably tragic event for millions of people, but did you know that it was persons with disabilities that were the first to be taken away to be murdered, because they were to be considered "unclean". Even today there are countries, including ours (the USA) where parents abandon, hide, and even murder children and adults with disabilities. While this doesn't happen a lot in our country anymore, this is not uncommon in many countries around the world.
I do want to lift up an amazing recent growth in awareness of persons with disabilities and their rights as individuals in society and in congregations, but there is a lot of work to do and it does start with the language. I choose to use "person first language"; which means that I recognize that the individual as a person first and the disability is only secondary, ex: James, who has autism, likes to ride a bike. First he is a person, secondly he HAS a disability (vs. Austisic Jame likes to ride a bike); this helps to emphasize what is more important, that being he is James and not his autism.
Even though I have my preferences, it is important to pay attention to how the individual recognizes and refers to himself/herself. The reason I say this is; it has been my experience that persons with disabilities use differing language depending on the community, culture, age, etc. Just like you and I may use differing language, individuals with disabilities do as well. I knew a woman in seminary who used the term "limp" to describe herself. I would NEVER use this term without her permission or for anyone else. However, this was a term that she grew up with and fit how she saw herself in relation to the world. Be careful though, I would not recommend using words like crippled, limp, retarded, and others that seem controversial, because those terms are overall leaving what is considered socially acceptable.
I know language is a very difficult thing to stay caught up on because language is something that is always changing and adapting. However, a congregation is supposed to be made up of people in the community and therefore needs to adapt and fit the needs of the people in the community. This means learning about how and why these terms are changing, and more importantly what do the individuals with disabilities think about the use of these terms. THIS IS IMPORTANT, ask a variety of people with a variety of disabilities about their opinions. One person does not speak for everyone, and opinions WILL very.
Thank you all for your time. Please give me any of your thoughts. Remember I am only speaking from my experience and speaking to others. I am speaking from my perspective within the Christian tradition in this blog, BUT I would like this to be an open discussion and I welcome any thoughts, reflections, or opinions from people of other faith traditions.
P.S. I will be writing once a week (at least) from now on. I promise.
Blessings and Peace
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