Reviews

Summary <p content-type="flush left">Wondrously Wounded sets out to reconfigure our theological idea of what disability is. It moves away, not only from charity or medical models, but also from some current thinking in disability theology (that those labelled disabled reveal humanity’s true vulnerability) to a starting point of all life being a gift, so all capable of mediating God’s goodness. Brock grounds his argument in patristic ideas of a radical Christian human solidarity, and a convincing exegesis of 1 Corinthians 12, the body of Christ and spiritual gifts. The whole is brought to life by an account of Brock’s son, Adam, who is labelled disabled, but who under this analysis is perhaps the healthiest of us all. This is an important next step in the development of a convincing Christian theology of disability.

Disability, Anthropology, and Flourishing with God: A Kierkegaardian Account

How can the writings of Søren Kierkegaard address contemporary issues in the theology of disability? For while it is surely true that Kierkegaard had ‘no concept of “disability” in the contemporary sense’ of the term, I will argue that there is much in Kierkegaard’s writings that addresses issues related to disability. I begin by exploring Kierkegaard’s discussion of suffering and its application to disability theology. I argue that while this has some application, it doesn’t get to the heart of the issue, since a theology of disability must address more than the issue of suffering. Instead, I argue, we should look to Kierkegaard’s anthropology because it is here that we find a vision of what it is to be truly human, and, therefore, how we might understand what it means for those with disabilities to be truly human. To do this, I outline the account of the human being as spirit in The Sickness Unto Death, noting its inability to include certain individuals with severe cognitive disabilities. A straightforward reading of Sickness suggests that Kierkegaard would think of those with cognitive disabilities as similar to non-human animals in various respects. Noting the shortcomings of such an approach, I then offer a constructive amendment to Kierkegaard’s anthropology that can retain Kierkegaard’s concern that true human flourishing is found only in relationship with God. While Kierkegaard’s emphasis on teleology can be both affirming and inclusive for those with disability, I argue that we need to look to Kierkegaard’s account of ‘neighbor’ in Works of Love to overcome the difficulties with his seemingly exclusive anthropology.

Disability Liberation Theology

This chapter considers the ways images of disability liberation might reimagine the question of how we should live as people with disabilities. To do so, it offers a version of disability liberation theology that draws together the visual iconography of the mid-twentieth-century civil and human liberation movements and the theological tradition of the Catholic Marian tradition. To support this explication of disability liberation theology, the chapter reviews the history of liberty as a sociopolitical concept, the cultural work of images, the disability theology critique of Biblical healing narratives, the critique of a medical model of disability, disability liberation theology, and care ethics. The chapter concludes by putting forward images of interdependent bodily care in the early Marian tradition as potentially liberatory and a possible guide to disability justice. By portraying acts of bodily care as sacred rituals, these images suggest a theoretical armature to consider intimate body care as an affirmation rather than a diminishment of human dignity.

Innledning: Religiøst medborgerskap

The introductory chapter gives an introduction to various aspects of religious citizenship. Drawing on an understanding of citizenship based on human rights, we present the UN documents and conventions that promote rights for persons with disabilities. We also present the most basic models of disability theorized within Disability Studies. Turning to the religious aspects of citizenship, we discuss important contributions from disability theology such as diversity as a gift given by God in creation, and images of God as a vulnerable, even disabled God through Christ’s incarnation. The World Council of Churches has contributed to a rights-based theological understanding of disability through the documents A Church of All and for All and The Gift of Being. These documents are introduced. The chapter also discusses diaconal perspectives on disability. We argue that the former diaconal practice of segregation, and the distinction between ‘able-bodied’ helper and disabled recipients of diakonia is gradually being replaced. Instead we see the emergence of a disability diakonia where vulnerability is reconfigured as something that affects all of humanity, and where communities of mutual support and generosity become the norm. Finally we discuss the ethical aspects of religious citizenship, arguing that the various professions involved in securing religious citizenship for all (e.g. health workers, social workers, ministers, deacons and religious educators), need to reflect on their professional praxis in order to have a human rights based approach that secures equality.

A Successful LIfe

This study contextualizes the case of the medieval disabled Benedictine monk and scholar Hermanus of the Reichenau with modern theological approaches to disability, resulting in the challenge of several assumptions. Neither Hermanus’ theology nor his identity are defined by his disability. This is both confirmed and contradicted by modern theologians. Liberation from expectations such as virtuous suffering and the importance of mutuality and community emerge as keys to a self-determined successful life fulfilling Shakespeare’s concept of a ‘narrative’. An explicit disability theology is not only not necessary, but may be counterproductive and limiting, both of God and of self.