-- Disability and Christian Theology [ENDNOTES, UNCORRECTED PROOF]

Notes introduction 1. Bureau of the Census, Press Release CB06-FF.10–2 (July 2006). 2. Bureau of the Census, Census 2000 Special Report 23: Disability and American Families (July 2005). 3. Bureau of the Census, Press Release CB06-FF.10–2 (July 2006). 4. World Health Assembly, Document A58/1 7: Disability, Including Prevention, Management, and Rehabilitation (April 15, 2005). 5. Longhurst, Bodies, i. 6. See, for example, Gallop, Thinking through the Body; Hancock, The Body, Culture, and Society; Camporesi, The Incorruptible Flesh; Longhurst, Bodies; Gallagher and Laqueur, Making of the Modern Body; Shildrick, Leaky Bodies and Boundaries; Tambornino, The Corporeal Turn; Brook, Feminist Perspectives on the Body; and Davis, Embodied Practices. 7. Hannaford and Jobling, Theology and the Body; Raphael, Thealogy and Embodiment; Law, Religious Reflections on the Human Body; Bekkenkamp and de Haardt, Begin with the Body; Coakley, Religion and the Body; Ellison and ThorsonSmith, Body and Soul; Isherwood, Good News of the Body. 8. In the sections that follow, I will typically refrain from putting “normal” or “healthy” in quotation marks, but I hope that readers will recall that such terms should be regarded with suspicion. As later sections of this work will show, the model I propose challenges the notion that any one of us is, or can be, normal, as well as the notion that anyone can describe what a normal body is. 9. Audience members voiced a competing concern that the discipline of disability studies not become ghettoized or marginalized by limiting entrance to those with recognizable impairments. Similarly, competing tensions 3070-149-1pass-BM1-r02.indd 121 8/14/2008 9:54:16 AM 122 notes to pages 5–14 related to insider/outsider designation can be seen in other identity issues, such as race, gender, culture, and religion. 10. An interesting exception, to which I will return later in this book, is that the field of disability studies often shows a prejudice against those with cognitive or emotional disabilities. 1 1. Titchkosky, Disability, Self, and Society, 10. 12. See Foucault, Madness and Civilization. 13. And, as I will argue later in this work, they rarely fit for most others as well. 14. Anderson, Graduate Theological Education and the Human Experience of Disability, 57 . 15. I have elsewhere described this as a “limit-ness” model to further accentuate the distinctions between this proposal and the negatively valued connotation of the more common word “limitedness.” See Creamer, “The Withered Hand of God,” and Creamer, “ ‘God Doesn’t Treat His Children That Way.’ ” 16. Davis, Enforcing Normalcy, 1. 1 7 . Davis, Bending Over Backwards, 25. 18. Ibid., 10. 19. Davis, Enforcing Normalcy, 2. 20. Ibid., xvii. 2 1. Because of the diversity of experiences held within the one category “disability,” I would argue that this partiality is the case for all who do disability studies—a person in a wheelchair cannot fully know the experience of someone who uses American Sign Language as their primary mode of communication. 22. Rosemary Radford Ruether has recently critiqued this view that “early feminism” was exclusive and universalizing as overly simplistic. See Ruether, “A White Feminist Response to Black and Womanist Theologies.” 23. bell hooks, Feminist Theory, x. 24. Ibid., 18. 25. Welch, “Sporting Power,” 1 74. 26. Ibid., 183. 27 . A term used by hooks and others to highlight a lack of attention to women of color. 28. hooks, Feminist Theory, 15. 29. Briggs, “The Politics of Identity and the Politics of Interpretation,” 1 73. 30. Bartky, “Foreword,” in Men Doing Feminism, xii. See also Jardine and Smith, Men in Feminism. chapter 1 1. Thomson, Extraordinary Bodies, 6. 2. Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, Public Law 101–336 (July 26, 1990). 3. Bureau of the Census, Census Brief 97–5 (December 1997). 4. Bureau of the Census, Press Release CB06-FF.10–2 (July 2006). 5. World Health Organization, Fact Sheet 135: Population Ageing: A Public Health Challenge (September 1998). 3070-149-1pass-BM1-r02.indd 122 8/14/2008 9:54:16 AM notes to pages 14–22 123 6. Ibid. 7 . See, for example, Smith and Hutchison, Gendering Disability; Morris, Encounters with Strangers; and Hans and Patri, Women, Disability and Identity. 8. Fine and Asch, Women with Disabilities, 6. The authors note that race and other identity conditions also add to this experience of handicap. 9. Deegan and Brooks, Women and Disability. 10. Stuart and Ellerington, “Unequal Access,” 6–1 7; Fine and Asch, Women with Disabilities, 4. 1 1. Quoted in Stuart and Ellerington, “Unequal Access,” 16. 12. Of course, it is important to remember that disabled feminists, as with any other group, hold a wide variety of perspectives and stances. 13. Gartner and Joe, Images of the Disabled, Disabling Images, 207 . 14. Ruether, Sexism and God-talk, 20. 15. Thistlethwaite and Engel, Lift Every Voice, 3. 16. Pelka, Disability Rights Movement, xii. 1 7 . Stuart, “Disruptive Bodies,” 168. 18. For a thorough review of this topic, see Pelka, Disability Rights Movement, and Albrecht, Seelman, and Bury, Handbook of Disability Studies. 19. These images can be seen from Shakespeare (Richard III) and Melville (Ahab) to Batman (the Joker and Two-Face) and Looney Tunes (Porky Pig and Elmer Fudd). See Gartner and Joe, Images of the Disabled, Disabling Images, and Longmore, Why I Burned My Book and Other Essays on Disability. 20. Buck v. Bell, 274 U.S. 200 (1927). 2 1. Pelka, Disability Rights Movement, 53. 22. Ibid., xi. 23. Ibid. This ordinance was not repealed until 1974. Similar ordinances were also passed in San Francisco, Omaha, and Columbus. 24. PARC v. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, 334 F. Supp. 1257 (1972), established, for the first time, the right of children with disabilities to receive a public education, sparking an explosion of other disability rights litigation. 25. Disability rights activists will be quick, though, to point out the prevalence of portrayals of disability by nondisabled actors, also known as “disability blackface” (e.g., the actor who portrayed the wheelchair-using oldest brother on the television show Joan of Arcadia does not use a wheelchair himself). and the emphasis on “acceptable” images of disability, such as people with disabilities who “pass” (e.g., the lead character on Sue Thomas FBI was often praised for not appearing Deaf) or who play the stereotypical role of either victim (Jerry’s Kids) or “supercrip” (having special powers connected to their disability, as the character of Johnny Smith in The Dead Zone, or who are portrayed as triumphing over adversity and being inspirational as a result of their disability, as in any given “movie of the week”). See Nelson, The Disabled, the Media, and the Information Age. 26. Thomson, Extraordinary Bodies, 5. 27 . Snyder, Brueggemann, and Thomson, Disability Studies, 2. 28. Wilson and Lewiecki-Wilson, Embodied Rhetorics, xi. 29. Davis, Disability Studies Reader, 3. 30. Ibid., 2. 3070-149-1pass-BM1-r02.indd 123 8/14/2008 9:54:16 AM 124 notes to pages 22–33 3 1. Gilman, Disease and Representation; Rothman, The Discovery of the Asylum; Goffman, Stigma; Fiedler, Freaks; Sontag, Illness as Metaphor; Bakhtin, Rabelais and His World; Foucault, The Birth of the Clinic; Derrida, Memoirs of the Blind; Butler, Bodies That Matter; and Bordo, Unbearable Weight. 32. See McCloughry and Morris, Making a World of Difference, 9. 33. Mitchell and Snyder, The Body and Physical Difference, 1. 34. Donoghue, “Challenging the Authority of the Medical Definition of Disability,” 200. 35. Goffman, Stigma. 36. Freidson, “Disability as Social Deviance,” 7 1–99. 37 . Eiesland, Disabled God, 101. 38. Barton, Disability and Society, 13. 39. Pelka, Disability Rights Movement, 3. 40. Ibid. 4 1. It is interesting to note that differing views of self and society have influenced the emergence of the disability rights movement in different locations. See Hurst, “The International Politics of Disability,”18. 42. Charlton, Nothing about Us without Us, 3. 43. Ibid., 1 7 . 44. McCloughry and Morris, Making a World of Difference, 1 7 . 45. Corker and French, Disability Discourse, 2. 46. Ibid., 4. 47 . Shildrick, Leaky Bodies and Boundaries. 48. Peters, “The Politics of Disability Identity,” 2 15. 49. The capitalized term indicates the culturally Deaf, those who use sign language as their primary form of communication and who identify with the Deaf community, as opposed to the noncapitalized word “deaf,” which simply indicates those who experience a loss of hearing. 50. For more information on this perspective, see Branson and Miller, Damned for Their Difference, and Bragg, Deaf World. 5 1. Davis, Disability Studies Reader, 6. 52. Woodcock, “Cochlear Implants vs. Deaf Culture?” 327 . 53. Ibid. 54. Corker and Shakespeare, Disability/Postmodernity, 15. 55. Branson and Miller, Damned for their Difference., xiv. 56. This model is a new proposal, but it is in line with demands by figures such as Lennard Davis, Mairian Corker, Tom Shakespeare, and Elizabeth Stuart that disability studies needs an alternative to the existing medical and minority frameworks. 57 . Davis, Enforcing Normalcy, 1. 58. Stuart, “Disruptive Bodies,” 168. 59. It is important to note that limits are not the same as impairment. As argued earlier, the insights of the medical and minority models are still valuable: people with disabilities (or with profound individual and social experiences of limits) are often oppressed, and functional limitations do (at least at times) lead to a diminished quality of life. The limits model instead offers a complementary third approach that questions 3070-149-1pass-BM1-r02.indd 124 8/14/2008 9:54:16 AM notes to pages 35–40 125 individual and societal understandings of normalcy and highlights human limits as appropriate for theoretical and theological reflection. chapter 2 1. Eiesland, “Barriers and Bridges,” 2 18. 2. Boylan, Women and Disability, 16. 3. Kern, Pastoral Ministry with Disabled Persons, 18 1. 4. Jackson, Conquering Disability; Moede, God’s Power and Our Weakness. 5. Webb-Mitchell, Unexpected Guests at God’s Banquet, 9. 6. For example, a 2000 study by the National Organization on Disability found that people with disabilities are less likely to attend religious studies at least once per month (47 percent) than are people without disabilities (65 percent). The same study suggested that this is not an indication of religious faith, in that 84 percent of people with disabilities and 87 percent of people without disabilities consider religious faith to be important to them. National Organization on Disability, 2000 Survey of Americans with Disabilities. http://www.nod.org (accessed September 8, 2007). 7 . Eiesland, Disabled God, 70–7 1. 8. Ibid. 9. Miles, The Word Made Flesh, 1. 10. Important exceptions include Brown, The Body and Society; Bynum, Fragmentation and Redemption; and Coakley, Religion and the Body. The “body craze” mentioned in the introduction to this book is having an impact in historical studies on religious texts and traditions, so it is likely that scholarship in this area will drastically expand in the near future. 1 1. Miles, Fullness of Life, 10. 12. Martin, Corinthian Body, 3. 13. Avalos, Illness and Health Care in the Ancient Near East, 26. 14. Tan, “The Disabled Christ,” 8. 15. Brown, The Body and Society, 9. 16. Edwards, “Constructions of Physical Disability in the Ancient Greek World,” 36. 1 7 . Brown, Boundaries of Our Habitations, 148. 18. Ibid. 19. Ibid., 3. 20. Davaney, Pragmatic Historicism, 1. 2 1. Ibid., 150. 22. See, for example, Wilson and Lewiecki-Wilson, Embodied Rhetorics; Snyder, Brueggemann, and Thomson, Disability Studies; Schilling, The Body and Social Theory; Cohen and Weiss, Thinking the Limits of the Body; and Coupland and Gwyn, Discourse, the Body, and Identity. 23. For a discussion of some of the various perspectives on the body in nonChristian religious traditions, see Hinnells and Porter, Religion, Health, and Suffering; Kinsley, Health, Healing, and Religion; Coakley, Religion and the Body; Freeman and Abrams, Illness and Health in the Jewish Tradition; and Eilberg-Schwartz, People of the Body. 3070-149-1pass-BM1-r02.indd 125 8/14/2008 9:54:16 AM 126 notes to pages 40–45 24. Important works dealing specifically with a history of disability include Abrams, Judaism and Disability; Stiker, Corps infirmes et sociétés; Garland, Eye of the Beholder; Mitchell and Snyder, The Body and Physical Difference; and Covey, Social Perceptions of People with Disabilities in History. 25. Brown, The Body and Society. 26. These include Bynum, Holy Feast and Holy Fast, and Bell, Holy Anorexia. 27 . See Koenig, McCullough, and Larson, Handbook of Religion and Health, 24–52, for a time line of historical understandings of religion, science, and medicine. 28. Ferngren and Amundsen, “Medicine and Religion,” 54–55. 29. Stiker, Corps infirmes et sociétés, 39, 47ff.; Roccatagliata, History of Ancient Psychiatry, 4. 30. See Mauceri, The Great Break; Ferngren and Amundsen, “Medicine and Religion”; Edwards, “Constructions of Physical Disability in the Ancient Greek World”; Roccatagliata, History of Ancient Psychiatry; Hippocrates, The Writings of Hippocrates. 3 1. Plato, Phaedo, 197 . 32. Plato, Phaedrus, 246ab, 253–254b. 33. Aristotle, De Anima, bk. 2, chap. 1. 34. Aristotle, Generation of Animals, 4.3.767b, 4.6.775a. 35. Ibid., 4.3.769b. 36. Brown, The Body and Society, 9; Martin, Corinthian Body, 6. 37 . Berquist, Controlling Corporeality. 38. See Avalos, Illness and Health Care in the Ancient Near East, and Avalos, Health Care and the Rise of Christianity; Shuman and Volk, Reclaiming the Body. 39. Avalos, Illness and Health Care in the Ancient Near East, 235. 40. Deuteronomy 28:27–28, 35, 60–6 1. 4 1. Numbers 12:1–16. 42. 2 Samuel 24:10–25. 43. Exodus 15:26. 44. Berquist, Controlling Corporeality, 1 1. 45. Avalos, Illness and Health Care in the Ancient Near East, 249. 46. Avalos, Health Care and the Rise of Christianity, 37 . See also Sawyer, Reading Leviticus. 47 . Stiker, Corps infirmes et sociétés, 24. 48. Ibid., 26. 49. See especially the writings of Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza and Phyllis Trible for more on this issue. 50. Ware, “My Helper and My Enemy,” 92. 5 1. Isherwood and Stuart, Introducing Body Theology, 1 1. 52. Tan, “The Disabled Christ,” 12. 53. Mark 10:49; Matthew 9:22; Mark 1:4 1. For more on Jesus and healing, see Epperly, God’s Touch, and Porterfield, Healing in the History of Christianity. 54. Mark 3:1; Luke 13:10–1 1. 55. Matthew 2 1:14. 56. Robinson, The Body, 9. 3070-149-1pass-BM1-r02.indd 126 8/14/2008 9:54:17 AM notes to pages 46–54 127 57 . See Boyarin, A Radical Jew, esp. 59–85, for a detailed reading of Paul’s positive sensibility toward the body in spite of his Hellenistic-Platonic devaluation of the physical. 58. Roetzel, The Letters of Paul. 59. See Ware, “My Helper and My Enemy,” 93. 60. Jewett, Paul’s Anthropological Terms, 458. 6 1. Galatians 5:19–2 1. 62. 1 Corinthians 15:35. This interpretation is presented by Isherwood and Stuart, Introducing Body Theology, 63. 63. Bultmann, Theology of the New Testament, 192. 64. Ibid., 192–193. 65. Brown, The Body and Society, 54. 66. Tertullian De Pudic xiii.6; Against Marcion, bk. V, chap. xii. 67 . For a modern summary of these various interpretations, see Sampley, “The Second Letter to the Corinthians,” 164–167 . 68. Leary, “A Thorn in the Flesh,” 520–522. 69. Woods, “Opposition to a Man and His Message,” 52. 70. Chrysostom, Homilies on II Corinthians, homily XXVI. 7 1. McCant, “Paul’s Thorn of Rejected Apostleship,” 55 1. 72. Russell, “Redemptive Suffering and Paul’s Thorn in the Flesh,” 565–566. 73. Garrett, “Paul’s Thorn and Cultural Models of Affliction,” 83. 74. Isherwood and Stuart, Introducing Body Theology, 16. 75. For a review of these positions, see Dunnill, “Being a Body,” 1 10. 76. See Avalos, Health Care and the Rise of Christianity; Stark, The Rise of Christianity; and Stark, “Epidemics, Networks, and the Rise of Christianity.” 77 . For a more detailed description of this complex period in history, see Bynum, Fragmentation and Redemption; Bynum, The Resurrection of the Body in Western Christianity; Jantzen, Power, Gender and Christian Mysticism; and Biller and Minnis, Medieval Theology and the Natural Body. 78. Stuart, “Disruptive Bodies,” 169. 79. See Creamer, “Finding God in Our Bodies”; Eiesland, Disabled God; and WebbMitchell, Dancing with Disabilities. 80. See Majik, “Disability for the Religious,” 24–25. 8 1. Block, Copious Hosting, 50. 82. Ibid. 83. Ibid., 5 1. chapter 3 1. West, “The New Cultural Politics of Difference,” 93. 2. See, for example, Foucault, Power/Knowledge and Discipline and Punishment; Merleau-Ponty, Phenomenology of Perception; and MacIntyre, Dependent Rational Animals. 3. Saiving, “The Human Situation.” 4. Daly, Beyond God the Father, 19. 3070-149-1pass-BM1-r02.indd 127 8/14/2008 9:54:17 AM 128 notes to pages 54–59 5. Ibid., 9. Daly’s views changed drastically only a few years later, when she called for women to abandon patriarchal/institutional Christianity altogether. 6. Ruether, Sexism and God-talk, 1 16, 19. 7 . Ibid, 13; italics in original. 8. Cone, God of the Oppressed, 15. 9. Gutiérrez, Theology of Liberation, xiii. 10. These scholars themselves exhibited universalizing tendencies; their importance here comes from their demand that theology pay attention to experiences of difference. 1 1. Hull, Scott, and Smith, All the Women Are White, All the Blacks Are Men, But Some of Us Are Brave. 12. Some scholars are beginning to attend to disability as a theological issue, either on its own or within the context of other identity concerns. See, for example, the work of Elizabeth Stuart, Doreen Freeman, and myself. 13. For example, as of the time of this writing, there have been no articles on disability in the Journal of the American Academy of Religion. 14. Three important exceptions are Ruether, Gender, Ethnicity, and Religion; Chopp and Taylor, Reconstructing Christian Theology; and Bach, Women in the Hebrew Bible. 15. For example, Adams et al., Readings for Diversity and Social Justice; Freedman and Holmes, The Teacher’s Body. 16. McFague, Body of God, 108. 1 7 . Nelson, Body Theology, 42. 18. Ibid., 50. 19. Isherwood and Stuart, Introducing Body Theology, 22. 20. Dunnill, “Being a Body,” 1 10. 2 1. Griffith, Born Again Bodies. 22. Cahill, Theological Bioethics. 23. Glucklich, Sacred Pain. 24. Althaus-Reid and Isherwood, The Sexual Theologian; Pinn and Hopkins, Loving the Body. 25. McFague, “An Earthly Theological Agenda,” 2. 26. McFague, Metaphorical Theology, 143. 27 . McFague, Models of God, ix. 28. Ibid., 97–180. 29. McFague, Body of God, 149. 30. Her reason for identification with the Christian tradition appears to be pragmatic as well—noting that traditional images are often destructive, she seeks to offer alternatives that can benefit the tradition and do less harm. Note, however, that a number of commentators question how well her models actually cohere to the Christian tradition. See, for example, Schrein, Quilting and Braiding. 3 1. McFague, Body of God, ix. 32. Ibid., x. 33. For a nuanced description of McFague’s criteria for theological adequacy, see McFague, Body of God, esp. 13–25; French, “The World as God’s Body”; and Davaney, Pragmatic Historicism, esp. 90–99. 3070-149-1pass-BM1-r02.indd 128 8/14/2008 9:54:17 AM notes to pages 60–65 129 34. McFague, Body of God, vii. 35. Ibid., viii. 36. Ibid., 14. 37 . Ibid., viii. 38. Ibid. 39. Ibid. 40. Ibid., vii–viii. 4 1. Ibid., 16. 42. Ibid., 149. 43. Ibid., ix. 44. Ibid., 2 1 1. 45. McFague, Models of God, 64, citing Kaufman, Theology for a Nuclear Age, 42. 46. McFague, Models of God, 65. 47 . McFague, Body of God, 2–8. 48. Ibid., 7 . 49. Ibid., 150. 50. McFague, “Intimate Creation,” 42. 5 1. McFague, Body of God, 1 10. 52. Ibid., 108. 53. Ibid., 182. 54. Ibid., 206. 55. Ibid., 1 73. 56. Ibid., 1 74. 57 . Ibid., 1 72. 58. See, for example, Bracken, “Images of God within Systematic Theology”; Schrein, Quilting and Braiding; and Chapman, “What God Can Help?” 59. Wells, “The Flesh of God,” 58. See also Finger, “Trinity, Ecology and Panentheism.” 60. See, for example, Barbour, “Response to Critiques of Religion in an Age of Science,” 5 1–65. Barbour worries that, because the cosmos lacks the levels of organization and coordinated communication that McFague seems to imply, her model could revert to a mind/body dualism, where God is the mind and nature is still other. He finds greater promise in process thought. See also Jones, “Women’s Experience.” Jones notes that McFague’s story “leaves little room for a consideration of science’s own internally generated epistemic ruptures, gaps, and anomalies” (46). 6 1. Webb, “Should We Love All of Nature?” See also Palmer, review of Super, Natural Christians. 62. McFague, Life Abundant, xi–xiv. 63. Nunez, “Can a Christian Environmental Ethic Go Wild?” 64. For more on this critique, see Kwok, “Response to Sallie McFague.” 65. Also of interest, but out of the scope of the current project, are critical examinations of McFague’s metaphorical approach and her overall methodology. See, for example, Malone, “A Discussion of Sallie McFague’s Models of God,” (which includes commentary by Kaufman, Ruether, and Tracy); Sontag, “Metaphorical Non-sequitur”; and Davaney, Pragmatic Historicism, esp. 90–99. The reader may also be interested in 3070-149-1pass-BM1-r02.indd 129 8/14/2008 9:54:17 AM 130 notes to pages 65–76 comparisons between McFague and other major theological figures, including George Lindbeck (see Reynolds, “Walking Apart, Together” and “Parting Company at Last”); Paul Tillich (see Carey, Paulus Then and Now); and Jürgen Moltmann (see McWilliams, “Christic Paradigm and Cosmic Christ”). 66. See, for example, Carrol, “Models of God or Models of Us?” 67 . See Tatman, Knowledge That Matters, and Witt, “Epistemology in the Theological Writings of Rosemary Radford Ruether, Sallie McFague, and Carter Heyward.” 68. McFague, Body of God, 48. 69. Ibid. 70. Ibid., 54; italics in original. 7 1. Ibid., ix. 72. Clifford, review of Body of God, 36 1. 73. McFague, Body of God, viii. 74. Ibid., 1 75. 75. For example, the experience of cancer may be “chance,” but it also draws from genetic and environmental factors. For more on science and chance, see Thistlethwaite, Adam, Eve, and the Genome, esp. 52–68 on Mendelian genetics; and Barbour, Nature, Human Nature, and God. 76. McFague, Body of God, 1 76. 77 . Ibid., 108. 78. Ibid., 1 13. 79. Ibid., 1 14. 80. Ibid., 1 16. 8 1. Ibid., 12 1. 82. Ibid., 124. 83. As with any other minority group, however, it is important to recognize that “disability” is not the only category that frames identity, and that “the disabled” include both poor and rich, oppressed and affluent. 84. See Niebuhr, The Nature and Destiny of Man. Niebuhr is, of course, not the only one to propose these categories of sin. 85. This lie, for example, would suggest that it is “normal” to look like the cover of a fashion magazine, leading to dangerous body idealization, one factor that contributes to eating disorders and other self-destructive behavior. 86. McFague, Super, Natural Christians, 28, quoting Thistlethwaite and Engel, Lift Every Voice, 3. chapter 4 1. Cone, Black Theology of Liberation, 1. 2. Gutiérrez, Theology of Liberation, xiii. 3. Eiesland, Disabled God, 20. 4. Section 307 of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 states, “The provisions of this title shall not apply to private clubs or establishments exempted from coverage under title II of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (42 U.S.C. 2000-a(e)) or to reli- 3070-149-1pass-BM1-r02.indd 130 8/14/2008 9:54:17 AM notes to pages 76–83 131 gious organizations or entities controlled by religious organizations, including places of worship.” This section was an addition to the act as a result of successful lobbying by religious organizations, which argued that full compliance would create an “undue hardship” on their constituents (e.g., it would be too costly to remodel all places of worship) and that the Civil Rights Act of 1964 had set precedence for such an exception. 5. Eiesland, “Barriers and Bridges,” 2 15. 6. Eiesland, Disabled God, 67 . 7 . Ibid., 20. 8. Herzog, “We Have This Ministry,” 187 . 9. See, for example, National Organization on Disability, Interfaith Directory of Religious Leaders with Disabilities. http://www.nod.org (accessed September 8, 2007). 10. Herzog, “We Have This Ministry,” 187 . 1 1. Senior, “Beware of the Canaanite Woman,” 3. 12. Wilke, Creating the Caring Congregation, 30. 13. Block, Copious Hosting, 16. 14. This lack is beginning to see remedy, for example, through the creation of the Religion and Disability Studies Group of the American Academy of Religion in 2002. 15. University of Chicago Center on Emergent Disability, “Projects and Reports.” http://www.uic.edu/depts/idhd/ced/projects.htm (accessed January 3 1, 2004). 16. Albrecht, Seelman, and Bury, Handbook of Disability Studies, 5. 1 7 . Eiesland, “Encountering the Disabled God,” 13. 18. This image of God has similar consequences for people who identify as nondisabled, but it is particularly dangerous to those for whom childlike images are perpetuated in other (nonreligious) ways as well. For example, those who use wheelchairs are often “talked down to” (both literally and figuratively), and those with cognitive disabilities are often treated as children (e.g., assumed to be asexual). 19. Goldberg, The Changing of the Gods, 126. 20. Hull, “Blindness and the Face of God,” 2 15. 2 1. Eiesland, “Liberation, Inclusion, and Justice,” 2. 22. See, for example, Webb-Mitchell, “Making the Table Accessible”; Anderson, Graduate Theological Education and the Human Experience of Disability; and Herzog, “We Have This Ministry,” respectively. 23. Block, Copious Hosting, 1 1. 24. Ibid., 22. 25. Ibid., 91. Block does not explain or support this point but treats it as a selfevident claim. 26. Ibid., 22. 27 . Ibid., 120. 28. Ibid., 122–123. 29. Ibid., 143. 30. Black, “The Word Becomes Flesh.” 3 1. Black, A Healing Homiletic, 37–38. 32. Ibid., 34. 33. Ibid. 3070-149-1pass-BM1-r02.indd 131 8/14/2008 9:54:17 AM 132 notes to pages 83–98 34. Ibid. 35. Ibid., 37 . 36. Ibid., 4 1–42. 37 . Ibid., 186. 38. Ibid. 39. Ibid. 40. Ibid. 4 1. Eiesland, Disabled God. Others who have taken up the notion of the Disabled God in significant ways include Fernández, “Jesus Discapacitado”; Willis, “Claiming the ‘Fearsome Possibility’ ”; and Freeman, “A Feminist Theology of Disability.” 42. Eiesland, “Things Not Seen,” 103. 43. Eiesland, Disabled God, 22. 44. Eiesland, “Encountering the Disabled God,” 13. 45. Ibid., 14. 46. Chopp, foreword to Eiesland, Disabled God, 1 1. 47 . Eiesland, Disabled God, 22. 48. Ibid., 94. 49. Ibid., 3 1. 50. Eiesland’s interpretation of the image of Jesus as a person with a disability is primarily metaphorical, but she also argues that real physical disability is apparent in stories of the crucifixion and resurrection. 5 1. Eiesland, Disabled God, 101. 52. Ibid., 86. 53. Eiesland, “What Is Disability?” 28. 54. Ibid., 24. 55. Black and Elkins, Wising Up, 39. 56. In a similar vein, there has been very interesting discussion within the Roman Catholic Church about the pope’s ability to represent God through a disability. See, for example, Provost, “What If the Pope Became Disabled?”. 57 . See, for example, Petrella, Latin American Liberation Theology. 58. Eiesland, “What Is Disability?” 30. chapter 5 1. Cohen and Weiss, Thinking the Limits of the Body, 2–3. 2. See Derrida, Margins of Philosophy, 3–27 . 3. Davis, Enforcing Normalcy, xiv. Interestingly, many Deaf advocates do not hesitate to classify others as “disabled” using criteria from the medical model, even though such individuals might also reject such labeling themselves. 4. “Ableist” is a political term used by people with disabilities to call attention to assumptions made about normalcy. 5. Davis, Enforcing Normalcy, xiv. 6. For a review of signed language structure, see Wilbur, American Sign Language. 3070-149-1pass-BM1-r02.indd 132 8/14/2008 9:54:18 AM notes to pages 98–107 133 7 . This is counterintuitive for those of us who do hear because we may not even notice that “hard of hearing” references hearing (and Hearing culture). Because “hearing” (including “hard of hearing”) is interpreted as different from Deaf, to be called “very hard of hearing” is to be “very different from Deaf.” 8. See Black, “The Word Becomes Flesh,” 45–5 1, for more detail on each of these potential differences. 9. An interesting note, which highlights the overlapping structures of identity and minority status, is that, while the abbé’s first experience with the Deaf was with girls, he founded a school for boys. 10. See Padden and Humphries, Deaf in America, 27–29, for some of the folktales about the abbé. For a detailed history of the development of Deaf language and culture in Europe and America, see Lane, When the Mind Hears. 1 1. Davis, Enforcing Normalcy, xiv. 12. Padden and Humphries, Deaf in America, 2. 13. Black, “The Word Becomes Flesh,” 149. 14. I am using the phrase “cognitive disabilities” in preference to earlier terminology, such as “mental deficiency” or “mental retardation.” Other currently accepted terms, some of which will be used by sources that I cite, include “cognitive differences,” “intellectual disability,” or “developmental delay.” 15. See Pelka, Disability Rights Movement. 16. See, for example, Foucault’s studies of madness and medicine in Foucault, Madness and Civilization, and Foucault, The Birth of the Clinic. 1 7 . Trent, Inventing the Feeble Mind, 2. 18. Davis, Enforcing Normalcy, xiii. 19. Ibid., xiv. 20. The same tends to be true for emotional disabilities and mental illness. 2 1. Prior to January 1, 2007, this organization was known as the American Association on Mental Retardation. 22. American Association on Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities, Definition of Mental Retardation. http://www.aamr.org/Policies/faq_mental_retardation.shtml (accessed September 8, 2007). 23. Byrne, Philosophical and Ethical Problems in Mental Handicap, 2 1. 24. Ibid., 22. 25. Goffman, Asylums. 26. Wolfensberger, The Principle of Normalization in Human Services. 27 . Ibid., 13. 28. Trent, Inventing the Feeble Mind, 267 . 29. Parmenter, “Intellectual Disabilities—Quo Vadis?” 290. 30. Hinkle, “Smart Enough for Church,” 2. 3 1. Ibid. 32. Amos Yong has recently engaged in such a project, but he notes his own struggle as an academic attempting to “translate” or honestly portray these voices and stories. See Yong, Theology and Down Syndrome. 33. Webb-Mitchell, God Plays Piano Too, 5. 3070-149-1pass-BM1-r02.indd 133 8/14/2008 9:54:18 AM 134 notes to pages 107–1 12 34. Ibid., 14. 35. In addition to the work of Webb-Mitchell, see, for example, Hauerwas, “The Church and Mentally Handicapped Persons,” and Suffering Presence. For more on the L’Arche movement, see Vanier, The Challenge of L’Arche. 36. Eiesland, Disabled God, 96. 37 . An interesting question would be whether her notion of humanity in fact here becomes a definition of humanity. Do we include people who are not “self-consciously self-conscious,” due to cognitive or emotional disability, coma, or even infancy, in the category of “humanity”? 38. McFague, Body of God, 100. 39. Welch, interestingly, was herself a student of Sallie McFague, graduating from Vanderbilt in 1982. 40. Welch, Sweet Dreams in America, xix. 4 1. Ibid., 42–43. 42. Ibid., 43. 43. Ibid., xix. 44. McFague, Models of God, 3. 45. Eiesland, Disabled God, 47 . 3070-149-1pass-BM1-r02.indd 134 8/14/2008 9:54:18 AM