A few weeks ago, the Christian Examiner reported that a Florida gynecologist had his license revoked because he "kill[ed the] wrong twin." In a "selective" abortion, he "mistakenly [targeted] the healthy baby" and not the fetus with Down Syndrome. Maybe I read this article with some bias because my daughter Solveig has DS. Yes, the article left me utterly perplexed: it seems (morally) OK to abort a disabled fetus, but it is termed "killing" if the fetus is healthy!? Kellie Fiedorek (Americans United for Life) expressed that the mother's actions "reflect a mindset many people have toward individuals with disabilities - that somehow their lives are valueless and not deserving of being lived."

In contrast, I was consoled (at least a little bit) by the book Living Gently in a Violent World The Prophetic Witness of Weakness, written by theology professor Stanley Hauerwas and French-Canadian priest Jean Vanier (the founder of L'Arche [French for "The Ark"] communities where "normal" and disabled people live together). To whet your appetite for this small book, I let Hauerwas and Vanier "speak" to you in their own voices.

In this book, Vanier criticizes the "huge gap of injustice and pain[, ...] the gap between the so-called 'normal' world and the people who have been pushed aside ... because they are weak and vulnerable or even killed before birth" (29). Whenever the rights of people who are made in the image of God are violated, we need to ask, "Does the church really believe in the holiness of people with disabilities? Some people believe the church should do good things for the poor. But do we believe in their holiness?" Vanier gives an interesting answer: "I get upset when people tell me, 'You're doing a good job.' I'm not interested in doing a good job. I am interested in an ecclesial vision for community and in living in a gospel-based community with people with disabilities. We are brothers and sisters together, and Jesus is calling us from a pyramidical society to become a body" (34-5). This makes me think of the Apostle Paul who wrote in 1 Corinthians that all members of the (human and the ecclesial) body are equally important.

Hauerwas reflects on how L'Arche communities teach us about time and space (where the beauty of each person is recognized) "in a world of speed and placelessness" (48). Speed and placenessness cause us to trust in (for instance, mobility) technology. This trust in technology in general "undercuts the viability of community" (50). As an example Hauerwas states that, in the name of progress, "the task [of modern medicine] is not to care for patients but to cure them. When caring turns into curing, we don't know what to do with patients when we can't cure them" (ibid). "'[P]rogress we assume means eliminating what threatens to kill us or at least slow us down. But you can cure cancer without eliminating the patient. You cannot 'cure' the mentally handicapped without eliminating the patient. L'Arche stands as a reminder that 'progress' should not mean eliminating all that threatens us. After all, even if you cure cancer, you are going to die of some other ailment" (52). "[T]he medical imperative presumes that if we can do it, we have to do it. ... This relates to the presumption that people should not have children if they've been diagnosed with a mental disability - that abortion is the appropriate response. I think that presumption is based on our understanding of compassion; it is humanism gone mad [or did Hauerwas mean to say bad?]. ... Christian humanism is determined by the Father's sending of the Son to be one of us. So humanism must always begin with Jesus' humanity When that isn't the case, then in a world of speed and placelessness, compassion becomes a way to say certain people would be better off dead" (53).

This misplaced sense of compassion might have led this Florida gynecologist to agree to perform the abortion. But there is another way. Jean Vanier describes how he once was asked by a father to visit his pregnant wife. "She was forty years old and eight months pregnant. She was in tears and a bit hysterical - this was her first baby and she knew that the child had a disability. I saw immediately that I couldn't say a word to her. There are times when you must not say nice words. What I could do was send her to visit another mother who'd had a child a year previously with similar disabilities to the child she was going to have. The two women got together and wept" (68-9). This is a very vivid expression of what Vanier calls "gospel vision" - "a promise that we human beings can get [live] together. It is a vision of unity, peace and acceptance" (29), a vision to celebrate life together as a sign of hope in this wounded and broken world.

Based on Jesus' life and example who spent time creating relationships, Vanier emphasizes that "[t]o become a friend of Jesus [means] to become a friend of the excluded. As we learn to be a friend of the excluded, we enter into this amazing relationship with God" (41).

Yours in Christ Jesus,
Bjoern E. Meinhardt, Pastor