Inclusion in Worship

Inclusion Awareness Day Workbook 2004

Creating Congregations Where People of All Abilities Participate

Episcopal Congregations: Preaching with Dignity and Respect

When preaching on Inclusion Awareness Day, it helps to remember key factors:

• Use people-first language (see below).

• Stress mutual ministry.  People with disabilities can minister to others.

• People with disabilities are not super-human.

• We all rely on one another to live our lives.

• Don’t be afraid to preach about lament being a legitimate form of prayer.

• Stress the gifts that might be missed when we exclude certain groups of people, i.e. the call to inclusion benefits the entire church not only people with disabilities.

• Watch language that belies able-bodied bias such as “confined to a wheelchair”. Many people who use wheelchairs experience them as a liberating mobility device rather than confinement.

• Watch cultural stereotypes in biblical stories: i.e. uncleanness and sinfulness being reflected in physical or mental disabilities. 

Rev. Deborah Seles, Chair, Episcopal Diocese Inclusion Task Force