“Only God Is Able”
Psalm 146 & Colossians 2:6-15by Andrew J. Imparato, President and CEO
American Association of People with DisabilitiesDELIVERED AT
FAIRLINGTON PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH
ALEXANDRIA, VIRGINIA
June 27, 2004In today’s reading, Paul urges the Colossians to “live in” Jesus, “rooted and built up in” Jesus, and to be wary of “human tradition.” Paul reminds the Colossians that Christ became human so they could be “alive together with” him and Christ’s life “disarmed the principalities and powers” of the world.
What was Paul trying to convey? Or perhaps more importantly, what does Paul’s letter say to us today, living so close to the capitol of one of the most powerful nations in the history of the world?
At its core, Paul’s message to a Gentile population is a radical message of inclusion: Paul is telling the Colossians [and all of humanity] that we no longer need to concern ourselves with figuring out who is “chosen” by God, or with religious and cultural rules designed to separate out the chosen from the masses.
Paul would have grown up viewing Gentiles—that is, people whose ancestors were not Israelites—as religious enemies who were unworthy of the promises of God.
As Paul reminds the Colossians, Christ “set aside” these traditional distinctions and created a path for every human being to follow, if they have the courage and the faith to try.
Christ’s example teaches us to love all people, forgive all people, welcome all people, pray for all people, serve all people, value all people, lift up all people, and empower ALL people.
Christ’s revolutionary love was, in many ways, a threat to almost every human institution of his time. To this day, Christ’s example represents a powerful challenge to many of the traditions, policies and practices that many of us hold dear and sacred.
If we root ourselves in Christ’s revolutionary love, and if we seek to rebuild our lives based on that example, we will be challenged in ways that are difficult, uncomfortable, and sometimes scary.
As a disability rights advocate and civil rights lawyer, I hear Paul’s words in the context of the ongoing challenges facing people with disabilities and other historically marginalized groups in America today.
As a sophisticated “inside the beltway” crowd, you are probably not-at-all surprised to hear me “spin” the Bible in a way that serves my political interests [SMILE].
But, in all seriousness, human traditions and societal biases continue to lead to extreme inequalities for millions of children and adults throughout Virginia, our nation and the world.
The disability community has many diverse components. Oftentimes, the thread that links people with mental, physical and sensory disabilities together is not so much the similarity between their impairments as it is their common experience of oppression, exclusion, and discrimination.
An infant born with Down syndrome, a toddler who is Deaf or hard of hearing, a blind pre-school student, a fifth grader with muscular dystrophy, a high schooler with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, a college student with schizophrenia, a young adult with a spinal cord injury, a 40-year-old with multiple sclerosis, and a 75 year old with Alzheimer’s disease all face barriers that do not flow naturally from their diagnosis or condition.
My work has brought me into contact with individuals with all of these conditions who are living full and integrated lives with family and friends and making a difference in the world. As Martin Luther King once said, “Everybody can be great… because anybody can serve.”
The great tragedy for our country and others is that so many of our citizens are not given a real opportunity to serve to their full potential, in part because of fears, myths, stereotypes and artificially low expectations that accompany their physical, mental and sensory disabilities.
In America today:
Less than one third of disabled children graduate high school with a regular diploma.
Almost two thirds of adults with significant disabilities are not working.
Fewer than one in ten disabled adults own their own home.
Close to two million disabled children and adults have been warehoused in nursing homes, mental hospitals and other institutions, notwithstanding the strong desire of most of these individuals to live integrated lives in the community with family and friends.
Bringing this situation even closer to home, it is the sad reality that very few places of worship have made full inclusion of congregants with disabilities and their families the priority that it deserves to be, with the result that disabled people are much less likely to participate regularly in worship compared to the general population.
If we as a society are committed to the proposition that all individuals are created equal, and all people deserve to be given a chance to contribute to the lives of their communities as full participants, we can dramatically improve the quality of life of disabled people and make America work better for everyone at the same time.
Curb cuts and ramps are frequently used by children, seniors, delivery workers, parents pushing strollers, skateboarders, bicyclists, and now people riding Segways.
Captioning on television is frequently used by hearing people in a noisy environment like a restaurant. Inventions like the telephone and the typewriter were originally developed in response to the unique needs of people with hearing and visual disabilities.
The individualized education approach called for by our special education laws has been embraced by many educators as the right approach for ALL students in a modern classroom.
Universally designed buildings, products and systems are just that: designed for “universal” application, regardless of the particular needs of any user. Examples are things like an adjustable podium, a stairless entrance, a computer that can respond to a variety of inputs from voice to keyboard and can produce a variety of outputs including speech and Braille, or a voting machine that can voice the ballot in multiple languages for people who cannot read printed English.
My personal connection to disability began when I was finishing law school. In a matter of a few weeks, I went from being a confident visiting student at Harvard to a very anxious, very deflated young man with no real idea what was happening to me, why it was happening, or what if anything I could do about it. My first episode of serious depression left me with a deep sense of shame, guilt, and a strong desire not to be alive.
I had trouble getting out of bed in the morning, and was unable to even begin to write any of the papers that I knew I had to complete in order to finish law school. I spent a lot of time crying, fantasizing about getting hit by a car, and wishing I could go back to my childhood and avoid adult responsibilities. I also was very reluctant to discuss this dramatic downward change in my life with too many people. Finally, I had no idea how I was going to be able to function as a lawyer given the state I was in.
With critical support from my wife and a few close friends, I was able to weather this episode, seek help, and embark on my ongoing journey as a person living with bipolar disorder or manic depression. To this day, my life is characterized by 5-6 month periods of low energy and low self esteem followed by 5-6 months of the opposite—lots of energy and sometimes off-putting self-confidence. I consider myself fortunate that my cycles are as predictable as they are, because I can plan for them and arrange my life and work in a way that accounts for them. At the same time, I know that I am not an easy person to be married to, and I give my wife Betsy a lot of credit for hanging in there with me. Having a spouse who feels he is omnipotent half the year is no picnic! [SMILE]
Although my first job after law school was advocating for disabled children seeking federal benefits, it took me about a year to connect my personal mood disorder with the barriers faced by my client community.
Once I made that connection, however, I slowly stopped seeing my psychiatric condition as a source of shame—something that I assumed would be a professional liability as I began my legal career—and came to realize that my personal struggles could be a source of identity, credibility and strength in the context of the disability rights movement. By being “out” with my condition, I was learning about lots of other people who have had extraordinary careers notwithstanding the same or a similar diagnosis—people like Abraham Lincoln, Judge Learned Hand, presidential speechwriter Bob Boorstin, and psychologist and author Kay Redfield Jamison.
By working for and with people with a wide range of disabilities, I found strength, friendship and support from a diverse community that I had little knowledge of before beginning work in this field. With few exceptions, this community welcomed me with open arms and helped me get to the position I hold today as the leader of the largest cross-disability membership organization in the U.S.
So what does all of this have to do with Paul’s letter to the Colossians? As I see it, Paul’s letter is inviting us to reimagine a world where all people, including all disabled people, are truly loved, valued and respected. In such a world, we would not have the extreme inequalities we have in America today. Because of our failure as a society to reinvent ourselves, we continue to assign too many people to a life of poverty, isolation, exclusion and paternalism.
Like Paul, the psalmist who wrote today’s Old Testament reading describes the limits of human role models. “Put not your trust in princes,” we are told. Instead, we are encouraged to look to the “God of Jacob” as our model, a God who “executes justice for the oppressed,” “gives food to the hungry,” “sets the prisoners free,” “opens the eyes of the blind,” “lifts up those who are bowed down,” and “watches over the sojourners.”
Rooting ourselves in Jesus and the God of Jacob is an easy thing for us to talk about. Making it happen is another matter altogether. In my own life, despite the insight that my work in disability rights has given me, I have failed repeatedly to make room in my life for difficult, challenging people.
My older sister, Cathy, spent most of her adult life battling a host of demons. After graduating from high school, Cathy began experimenting with drugs and entered into a downward spiral that included heroin addiction, abusive relationships and, ultimately, prostitution and incarceration. She was significantly older than me and I never felt like I really knew her as a person. After our father died, Cathy reached out to me repeatedly with letters from prison asking for me to send money, pictures of my children, and news of my life. She also shared with me that she had recently been diagnosed with bipolar disorder by a prison psychiatrist.
Unable to get past my own selfish desire to insulate myself and my wife and children from Cathy’s often-destructive life, I did not respond to her letters. The rule I invented to rationalize my behavior was that I would write her back if she ever sent me a letter that did not ask for money.
Before I ever found the wisdom and love to respond to my sister in need, Cathy died of a drug overdose. I deeply regret my stubborn selfishness, and I feel especially bad because I didn’t recognize that what Cathy most needed from me was exposure to a path that could lead her to a happier and healthier life. Clinging to the precious existence I had created with my family in Baltimore, I stingily kept her out of my life.
As we all seek to root our lives in Jesus, we must work at loving and welcoming the people in our lives who are most difficult, most challenging, or least attractive. We must try to love the people whom we see as enemies and embrace the people toward whom we have the greatest fears or aversions. This can be incredibly difficult, but when we are able to do it, we are transformed in the process.
As we seek to bring Paul’s and the psalmist’s message to our life and work as Presbyterians and Christians, we should start by looking for little ways to leave our personal comfort zones in an effort to welcome into our lives people who don’t always look, act, speak, or think like us.
Rooting our lives in Jesus, we can take extra time to explain something to a person with an intellectual disability. We can encourage our children to befriend classmates who are unpopular or isolated from their peers. We can volunteer to deliver meals on wheels and get to know the life stories and idiosyncrasies of the people on our route. We can volunteer to serve as a reader for someone who is blind or a mentor for a disabled student interested in what we do as a possible career.
Sometimes, a creative approach to a thorny challenge can produce surprising results. My colleague Ginny Thornburgh, who runs the Religion and Disability Program at the National Organization on Disability, shared with me the story of a young boy with autism in Missouri who was unable to sit still in the pew during services. Of course, as I’m sure the parents here today can attest, you don’t need to have a disability to have trouble sitting in a pew for an hour. [SMILE]
Over time, the boy’s mother discovered that if she gave him a program and let him fold it repeatedly, the process of folding the program would calm him and enable him to get through the service.
One of the other congregants noticed this and encouraged the young boy to try his hand at Origami. As you might expect, he was a natural, and he spent many services since this time creating extraordinary works of art. Thanks to the creative approach of one church member, he went from being a distraction to being a treasured member of the church family, and his beautiful creations now decorate the assembly hall at the church.
Armed with greater insights and sensitivities from our personal efforts to include disabled people and other marginalized groups, we can seek to be a force for greater inclusion within our worship communities and other groups to which we belong.
By making deliberate efforts to live our lives in a way that embraces all of human diversity, we can change our communities and ultimately the world. In this process, we must keep in mind that as human beings we are inherently limited. But, with God’s help, we can achieve great things.
As the Reverend Martin Luther King reminded us,
“Only God is able. It is faith in him that we must rediscover. With this faith we can transform bleak and desolate valleys into sunlit paths of joy and bring new light into the dark caverns of pessimism.”
Please join me in prayer:
Dear and gracious God, thank you for inspiring us through Christ’s example to be ambassadors of revolutionary love and empowerment. Please help us to listen to disabled people and others in our lives whom we so often overlook. Please help us to reimagine a world where disability is viewed as a natural part of the human experience and not something to be feared, cabined, or pitied. Help us to realize that when we follow Christ’s example and make room for difficult people, our lives can be improved and transformed in ways we cannot imagine. In Christ’s name we pray, AMEN.
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