Good news folks! My Curacy is officially sorted. Actually, that's a lie, it's not 'officially' sorted until I sign something, so I still can't blog about where it is (lest an unwitting congregation member stumble across this blog... not that that's likely but there we go!) We've been on a second visit and met a variety of key members of the team ministry and congregations and everyone is happy, including us.
The one little clue, which I have revealed in the title of this post, is that it's a parish by the sea. I think this will be a lovely environment for Arthur to grow up in. I'm already imagining summer's evenings mucking around on the beach, sandcastles, ice creams, walking along the prom with the pushchair etc. etc. The churches look great, a real mix of traditions from catholic to evangelical, both town and rural. The training incumbent is absolutely super and I think we'll get on really well. All in all, a really positive prospect - can't wait!
But there's still a year of college to go, and the start of term is rapidly creeping up. One thing that's really on my mind is my dissertation. Cathy, the MTh tutor, suggested a while ago, in the middle of a conversation about the then pre-natal Arthur, that I might want to write about disability. This seemed like a sensible option. After all, it's meant to be a degree in Applied Theology, and what could be more 'real life' than the theological questions I was already asking? Back at that early stage I was asking: Why would God give someone the burden of a disability before they were even born? Why him, why not someone else? Should I want him to be healed?
Gradually, as I thought a bit more and read some disabled theology, my views began to change. I realised it was unhelpful to me to think about spina bifida as some sort of negative burden, and tried to think about it as something really positive, something God had given to the baby and to us for reasons which might one day become clear. I decided, therefore, that healing was inconsistent with God's plan in which he had predestined that our baby should have this condition, and therefore I wouldn't want the baby to be healed.
Now Arthur is here, my views have changed again. Now, I think about him as Arthur (who, alongside various quirks and personality traits, has spina bifida), rather than 'a spina bifida baby'. Whereas before I happily embraced spina bifida as part of his intrinsic identity, I'm now less inclined to believe that disability in any way defines him. Having done catheters every 3 hours for the last 5 weeks, I'm pretty convinced that, were there any way I could take the annoyance of doing catheters away from him, I would.
Anyway, I've gone off on a tangent. At least this shows I've been thinking about disability enough for it to be a decent dissertation topic. Rather than focusing on issues of why people are disabled, or issues of healing, I'm thinking about human flourishing - what God wants for humanity - and how disability fits into this. I've been watching the Paralympics and reading Tanni Grey-Thompson's autobiography recently, and these have given much food for thought on what 'potential' and 'achievement' might mean when it comes to disability.
Back to Arthur. Our trip to Urology a couple of weeks ago revealed that he has been overeating which would be fine for a baby who can naturally expel unneeded nutrients, but not so good for a baby who retains. Therefore, he is on a strict feeding regime where he is only fed as much as he needs for his weight. This has meant quite a lot of griping on his part, but we've been a lot less stressed as we've finally been able to get into a rhythm. I think Paul and I are splitting the tasks very well, so I'm not too worried about how we'll cope when term starts.
Hmm. Start of term. Three weeks away now!
No comments:
Post a Comment