Lisa Belkin maintains the Motherlode Blog for the New York Times Magazine. Unlike most parenting blogs, she frequently covers the subject of disability.
And I was delighted to see “Deciding Not to Screen for Down Syndrome” as the headline of her blog yesterday. She invited Amy Julia Becker, who is pregnant with her third child and already the mother of a girl with Down syndrome, to explain why she was not going to have prenatal testing on her third child.
This is not a defense of life under the umbrella of the sovereignty of God – there is not one mention of God.
But it highlights the fact that some of the most dangerous people our babies with disabilities will face are not ‘out there’ in the culture. Rather, it is the doctors, the very ones who should be caring for these precious, vulnerable, little ones, who are too often recommending a child’s destruction.
One answer to that: a program at the Robert Wood Johnson Medical School in which medical students meet families experiencing disability to get the real story. I liked that idea.
This is not sufficient to change the culture, of course. Only Jesus can do that.
But may God use this article to make many mothers and fathers – and hopefully doctors – pause to think before they make a horrendous, final choice about their child.
The Works of God 
Making fun of disability makes much of Christ in what ways?
Posted in commentary, News on September 9, 2010| Leave a Comment »
Stephen Hawking has written a new book, The Grand Design, in which he makes statements about God, or at least asserts that God is not necessary to explain the universe.
This isn’t a post about that. James Anderson wrote a helpful reply if you are interested in exploring that issue further.
No, this is a lament: There are ‘Christians’ who seem to think Dr. Hawking’s disability is worth mentioning in their usually-inadequate defense of God or the Bible. And by ‘mentioning’ I mean they use it in ways to make fun of or defame Dr. Hawking.
There were enough negative references to his disability on Twitter that a Washington Post blogger wrote a column on it.
I was hoping this was an over-statement – how could anyone be so rude? Or childish? Or uninformed? Unfortunately, after I read the comments attached to a couple of major newspaper articles, I saw the same thing as that Post blogger. It wasn’t many, but enough to be discouraging.
I expect this new book from Dr. Hawking will be an item for a while. So, even if it is only a few who conduct themselves badly in public, let’s help people in our churches understand two things:
I find it difficult to do this without being judgmental or self-righteous. That, of course, doesn’t invite people to consider the heart-work that needs to happen which results in a changed attitude and actions. It does us no good if people feel bullied into silence.
Yet, when people in our churches make a direct connection between disability, disease or suffering and God’s displeasure, they are contradicting the Biblical accounts of Job, the Apostle Paul and the man born blind. That can’t go unchallenged, even if the challenge needs to be winsome.
And that ultimately becomes a statement about God and his sovereignty over his creation.
Of course I disagree with Dr. Hawking’s conclusions about God. That breaks my heart.
But it also breaks my heart when those who claim the name of Jesus decide sarcastic remarks about disability will somehow make Jesus look beautiful.
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