Canada

When I first wrote for Do Justice, I asserted that – in order to achieve true justice in churches for believers with diverse disabilities – Christians need to “write sermons to which people with intellectual and learning disabilities can relate,” amongst other strategies. More broadly, we need to create intellectual access to our words and actions in churches.

"It started when God said, “Light up the darkness!” and our lives filled up with light as we saw and understood God in the face of Christ, all bright and beautiful." - 2 Corinthians 4:6 

Fifty years ago I first met my future brother-in-law Don, an energetic and endearing Indigenous five-year-old adopted by my future wife’s family at birth. He was part of the Sixties Scoop, but that term had not yet been coined back then. His maturation into adulthood was very rocky, and he spent a lot of time in prison. In 2001, aged 34, he died tragically of a heroin overdose in a rooming house in Toronto. 

Everything was created through him; nothing—not one thing!— came into being without him. What came into existence was Life, and the Life was Light to live by. The Life-Light blazed out of the darkness; the darkness couldn’t put it out. - John 1:3-5 MSG

Be wise in the way you act toward outsiders; make the most of every opportunity.  Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone. - Colossians 4:5-6

My family and I spent four years as missionaries in Italy, where we met hundreds of people from various countries in Africa and the Middle East who arrived in Europe seeking humanitarian protection. 

Matthew 6: 25-26 . Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? Look at the birds of the air: They do not sow or reap or gather into barns— and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?"

Whom have I in heaven but you? And earth has nothing I desire besides you. My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. - Psalm 73:25-26 

The following story contains descriptions of abuse.  Please hold this story with tenderness.

“You shall not misuse the name of the Lord your God, for the Lord will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name." Exodus 20:7