As we mourn in lonely exile here

by Aimée O’Connell

 

Autistic theologian Grant Macaskill, speaking on the difference between inclusion and belonging, says:

 

“To belong, you have to be missed;

to belong, you have to be named,

and enjoyed,

even in bodily absence;

and your absence has to be acknowledged

as an absence only from the physical space

and not an absence from the presence or from the workings of God.”

 

(Excerpted from The 2023 Scottish Episcopal Institute lecture, “Disabling Norms and Acentering Churches: Autism, Long Covid and the Return of the Old Normal” – October 26, 2023)

 

 

Advent is upon us, and we revisit the liturgical theme of waiting in hope: mournful, weary waiting; darkness, yearning for light; the forgotten, longing to be remembered; the invisible, seeking to be known. Advent is a natural fit for neurodivergent people who are already familiar with “exile” in our ordinary lives. All too often, we feel this separation most acutely from the margins of our parishes and church communities, having wandered there after learning we must check our vulnerabilities at the door in order to gain access, and finding the task insurmountable.

Armand Léon Van Ommen, a colleague of Grant Macaskill at the Centre for Autism and Theology at the University of Aberdeen, has published a book addressing this problem, Autism and Worship: A Liturgical Theology (Baylor University Press, 2023). What follows here is Fr. Mark Nolette’s review of this book, which also appears on his blog, The Anchorite.

 

Autism and Worship (A Book Review)

 

Look down from heaven and regard us

from your holy and glorious palace!

Where is your zealous care and your might,

your surge of pity?

Your mercy hold not back!

For you are our father.

Were Abraham not to know us,

nor Israel to acknowledge us,

You, Lord, are our father,

our redeemer you are named from of old.

Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down,

with the mountains quaking before you!

Isaiah 63:15-16; 19

 

In a recent survey, nearly a thousand Protestant pastors were asked if people with disabilities would feel welcome in their churches. About 98 percent responded yes, of course they would feel welcome. How could anyone dare to hint otherwise? I know of no similar survey done of Catholic pastors, but I have every reason to believe that the result would be the same. Moreover, nearly every convention or workshop that I have seen advertised on the topic of ministry to disabled people always makes it a point to thank Catholic parish leaders for the splendid work they are already doing in this area. Many parishes like to use hymns such as “All Are Welcome” to bolster this conception. We’re there, or so we are to believe. Our doors are open. Ramps are in place. What else is there to do?

When we look at statistics from the point of view of autistic people, however, a very different picture emerges. Disabled people attend Sunday Mass less frequently than the typical Catholic. Some people have physical disabilities that make going to church or being there simply too difficult. Many are shut-ins, and have the Eucharist brought to them. Statistics consistently show us that, of all the varieties of disabilities that are out there, autistic people attend Mass (or services in Protestant churches) less often than any other group of disabled people. This is true even though many autistic people are physically capable of going to church.

 

Why is this? Are autistic people simply too lazy? Are they looking for an excuse to not go to Mass? Do they need to try harder?

 

Since I became involved with Autism Consecrated, I have seen messages from other autistic people who share their experiences of dealing with parish leadership. The stories are heartbreaking. It takes a great deal of faith to continue to seek a connection with the Church when one is constantly running into cement walls of misunderstanding and being ignored. We would all love it if the Lord would rend the heavens and come down, and thus become our shepherd!

Some parishes have lighting reminiscent of interrogation rooms. Some turn up their sound systems way too loud. Many parish communities show no patience or empathy for those who have differing needs. Harsh lighting actually causes some of us pain; it disables us so we cannot stay. Loud sound systems do this for others. Still others are overwhelmed by the sheer number of people and the seeming impossibility of meeting all their expectations. Youth ministry groups meet in loud gyms and presume that all teens love noise and physical activity – the kinds of things that have caused autistic teens humiliation before.

It’s not that we haven’t tried. However, we can’t seem to find the right password to get anyone to listen to us. We propose a sensory friendly Mass and are told that there are too few of us for them to bother with that. Some parishes offer a sensory-friendly room, which is a start, but it keeps autistic folks out of sight and out of mind, and lets everyone else think that all is well. Imagine a family where one child had to eat meals in a separate room, out of sight of the others. Would that child feel like a part of the family?

How, then, can we have a situation where the overwhelming majority of Church leaders believe that their communities are welcoming, while the majority of autistic people feel most unwelcome no matter what they say or do? How can we feel like we matter to the Church when no one will listen to our genuine needs? When no one even misses us when we are not there, or blames us if we are not there on Sunday?

Seeking to address such cognitive dissonance, Armand Léon van Ommen offers us his latest book, Autism and Worship. Dr. van Ommen is co-chair of the Centre for Autism and Theology (CAT) at the University of Aberdeen, Scotland. The other co-chair of CAT, Dr. Grant Macaskill, has already given us the excellent Autism and the Church – as much a must-read as this book, Autism and Worship, is for anyone who deals with community worship on any level.

Autism and Worship is a scholarly work, with plenty of footnotes and an extensive and fine bibliography. At the same time, the book remains readable for most educated laypeople. The writing style is generally easy to follow. Dr. van Ommen is not Catholic, but he cites a number of Catholic authors. He also quotes Vatican II’s Constitution on the Liturgy, Sacrosanctum Concilium. I say this to affirm that there is very little here that is not in harmony with basic Catholic teaching on the Church and the liturgy. In fact, Dr. van Ommen argues that one major factor of the cognitive dissonance that many autistic people feel when it comes to church participation is a refusal to be consistent with the theology and the liturgy that we already claim to believe in.  The other factor is a refusal to listen to and take seriously the stories that autistic people themselves tell.

Too often, as is the case with other kinds of disabled people, the tendency in church settings (and many other settings) is to talk about autistic people and not with them. This habit is based on a medical approach, describing anything that is common to autistic people as pathological in nature, usually without bothering to hear from autistic people as to what such behaviors actually reflect. Most parish communities use the medical model as a justification in the exclusion of autistic people (passively or actively) instead of personally relating to them. In fact, churches do not need diagnoses, workshops or programs to minister to autistic people; they need vulnerability and compassion. As Dr. van Ommen shows, this goes a very long way.

This book begins by offering its readers an orientation to help them best understand the issues at hand. The first chapter deals with the need to be sensitive in the language we use to speak of autistic people. It introduces the emerging field of autism theology and introduces stories by autistic people about how they experience liturgy.

The second chapter wrestles with the nature and definition of autism, showing why the definition has shifted over time. This helps explain the confusion and lack of knowledge about autism today, as many of these explanations of autism exist side-by-side, even in the psychology community. It also shows that there is a real opening for us to speak theologically about autism.

The third chapter offers an explanation for what has become the major obstacle for Christian communities of all kinds to truly welcome autistic people (and others). The obstacle? Most people have been co-opted by the “cult of normalcy”, a phrase van Ommen gets from Lennard Davis and Thomas Reynolds. They no longer value people according to the Gospel, but according to the dictates of the god Normal and the goddess Average. The argument of this chapter is not unlike that which St. Paul makes to the Corinthians who have become divided because they have forgotten Christ and adopted the ways of the surrounding culture. The argument in this chapter is eye-opening and compelling. Once you see it, you cannot “un-see” it.

The fourth and fifth chapters are the heart of this book. Here is where Dr. van Ommen makes his argument from philosophy, theology and liturgy. We learn of the French philosopher Gabriel Marcel’s concept of availability. We are led from there to the Christian idea of kenosis (the self-emptying of Christ) and how this makes real availability possible by anyone who graciously lives this out. This kenosis cleanses us from our fear of deviating from the cult of normalcy and emboldens us to embrace a new (or better, the original) definition of who we are as Church, allowing it to shine forth in all its splendor. This, then, becomes the Church that is reflected in its liturgy, for liturgy (among other things) shows the Church who and what it is. If autistic people (among others) are not truly welcomed in liturgy, the Church is not truly itself.

The sixth chapter tells the story of how one community, the Chapel of Christ Our Hope in Singapore, has been making an effort to truly welcome the autistic people in their midst. This community has about 25-30 autistic members. It tries to live out a theology of availability by listening to autistic people and offering what accommodations it can to help them worship. (It should be noted that such accommodations are not “unusual”, but are no different than wheelchairs, hearing aids, or eyeglasses.) One of the striking things about the experience of this worshipping community is that these accommodations did not involve any change in the structure of the liturgy itself, but were all about changes in the attitudes of the community as a whole and its leaders.

Who, then, should read this book? Autistic Catholics (and Christians in general) will find this book encouraging. Someone listens; someone gets it. Parish and diocesan leadership should read this book in a spirit of kenosis. There is a group of people they have excluded (knowingly or unknowingly) not only from liturgy but from the overall life of their communities. Repentance and conversion are needed. This is no time to maintain the usual spin. In this sense, this book would be a good read for Advent or Lent. Anyone in any kind of training for ministry should read this book. Anyone who would like to begin to see all this from the angle of their autistic sisters and brothers should read this book.

In short, I cannot recommend this book highly enough. I found myself pausing at nearly every page to reflect on some statement or insight. Dr. van Ommen says that he is not autistic, but he has modeled what he advocates. He has listened extensively to autistic people. Their voices matter in this book. It shows. Read it!

– Fr. Mark Nolette

 

A Cloud of Witnesses

by Fr. Mark P. Nolette

Twentieth Sunday of Ordinary Time (C)

Hebrews 12:1-4

 

In this world we have our troubles
Sometimes lonesome, sometimes blue,
But the hope of life eternal
Brightens all our hopes anew.

(Chorus)

I don’t want to get adjusted
To this world, to this world,
I’ve got a home that’s so much better,
I want to go to sooner or later,
I don’t want to get adjusted to this world!

– From the song “I Don’t Want To Get Adjusted”, attributed to Sanford Massingale. This quote is from the version that the folk group The Weavers recorded and sang live in the early 1950’s.  Many recorded versions of this song exist today. 

The terms “adjusted” and “well-adjusted” may be used less frequently now than they were a generation or two ago, but the meaning these terms express remains an ideal in psychology. One dictionary definition for “well-adjusted” is the following: “A well-adjusted person is reasonable and has good judgment. Their behavior is not difficult or strange”. Such a person is seen as socially acceptable and popular, a model for others to imitate.

We might think that, in the more fragmented society we live in today, any talk about being well-adjusted may be less compelling than it was in the past. On the contrary, it is even more true now. Each fragment in our society has more stringent requirements for accepting someone as “well-adjusted”, and more severe penalties for non-conformity. This reflects both the desperate need that human beings have to belong to something beyond ourselves as individuals, and the basic fact about human behavior that the great French social scientist René Girard points out – human beings learn by imitation.  We imitate other people, especially those of the group(s) we identify with.  Even people who present themselves as non-conformists are imitating behaviors they learned from people they admire, and are “not conforming” in ways that are acceptable to our society or at least the group(s) in society they identify with.  Even in their nonconformity, they conform! Those who fail to meet such societal standards are labeled as evil or mentally ill – often both.  Such societal standards are determined by whoever happens to be atop the social ladder at any given time.

Now there is nothing wrong, as a rule, with adopting the language, styles and customs of whatever society we belong to. There is nothing wrong, as a rule, with belonging to a political party or having differing opinions on various political issues. There is nothing wrong, as a rule,  with enjoying the good things that this world offers. The clear exception to this rule, for us who call ourselves Catholic Christians, is whenever anything is contrary to the truth that Our Lord has revealed to us through His Church.

This is where things get interesting. Remember that people learn primarily by imitation. We live in a fragmented society that presents a variety of values and norms to us – some of which are compatible with Catholic faith, and others which are not. We imitate what is around us, often without giving it a second thought. We do not notice – or do not want to notice – the cognitive dissonance between that various ideas and beliefs that are swirling about in our heads.

C.S. Lewis, in The Screwtape Letters, has Screwtape, the experienced tempter, explain this to his apprentice devil Wormwood.  Even though this was written nearly eight decades ago, it still hits home:

Your man has been accustomed, ever since he was a boy, to have a dozen incompatible philosophies dancing about together inside his head. He doesn’t think of doctrines as primarily ‘true’ or ‘false’, but as ‘academic’ or ‘practical’, ‘outworn’ or ‘contemporary’, ‘conventional’ or ‘ruthless’. Jargon, not argument, is your best ally in keeping him from the Church. Don’t waste time trying to make him think that materialism is true! Make him think it is strong, or stark, or courageous—that it is the philosophy of the future. That’s the sort of thing he cares about.

Why do we do this? For one thing, we don’t want to look bad. We want to have it both ways, as long as we can manage it. We don’t even want to think about the incompatible ideas swirling about in our brains. We want to be acceptable to the people whose opinion of us matters. We try to be Catholic and other things, all at once. However, as Christ reminded us, we cannot serve two masters, let alone three or more. We will always end up choosing one over the others when the going gets tough in any way.  The choices we make then tell us – and others – who our real master is, if we are honest enough with ourselves to get the message.

Let me use publications, rather than people, as examples of what I am trying to get at. Some Catholic publications in this country have a politically progressive lean to them. Others have a politically conservative lean to them. As such, this need not be a problem. The problem arises when there is a conflict between what secular progressives or conservatives think and what the Church teaches. Some of these publications, to their credit, side with the Church. Other Catholic publications will almost always ignore or criticize the Catholic approach whenever it is at odds with the approach of their political leanings. You see who the real master is.

I’ll use people as examples only in this sense. Our society offers us models of what a successful, well-adjusted person looks like. Sometimes, these models don’t agree with each other, let alone with the teachings of the Church in some areas. We learn by imitation.  Who do we imitate? What do we imitate?

Friends, I offer for your consideration the second reading in this Sunday’s Mass, taken from the Letter to the Hebrews. A few comments on this letter may be useful before we move on. It was assumed by many that this Letter was written by Saint Paul. However, it does not begin the way Paul’s other letters begin “Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus…”, nor does it end with Paul’s usual signature and farewell. The author is not named. In fact, the Letter to the Hebrews reads more like a homily given by a pastor to a congregation he knows well, in an effort to encourage them in their trials to remain faithful to the Lord.

Our reading, taken from the twelfth chapter of Hebrews, begins in this way:

“Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us rid ourselves of every burden and sin that clings to us and persevere in running the race that lies before us while keeping our eyes fixed on Jesus, the leader and perfecter of faith.”  

The author of Hebrews – or the ancient homilist, if our theory is correct – wants his readers and listeners to imitate “so great a cloud of witnesses” and Jesus Himself.

Who makes up this great cloud of witnesses? We discover this in the previous chapter of Hebrews, which last Sunday’s second reading was taken from. The reading focuses on Abraham, but the chapter as a whole speaks about a number of Old Testament witnesses, from Abel all the way to those who died in the persecutions described in the books of Maccabees. They are all presented as models of faith for Christians to follow.  What are we to notice in these models of faith? What should we learn from them? The author of Hebrews tells us:

All these died in faith. They did not receive what had been promised but saw it and greeted it from afar and acknowledged themselves to be strangers and aliens on earth, for those who speak thus show that they are seeking a homeland. If they had been thinking of the land from which they had come, they would have had opportunity to return. But now they desire a better homeland, a heavenly one. Therefore, God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them.

Later in the chapter, our author/homilist has more to add:

What more shall I say? I have not time to tell of Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, of David and Samuel and the prophets, who by faith conquered kingdoms, did what was righteous, obtained the promises; they closed the mouths of lions, put out raging fires, escaped the devouring sword; out of weakness they were made powerful, became strong in battle, and turned back foreign invaders. Women received back their dead through resurrection. Some were tortured and would not accept deliverance, in order to obtain a better resurrection. Others endured mockery, scourging, even chains and imprisonment. They were stoned, sawed in two, put to death at sword’s point; they went about in skins of sheep or goats, needy, afflicted, tormented. The world was not worthy of them. They wandered about in deserts and on mountains, in caves and in crevices in the earth. Yet all these, though approved because of their faith, did not receive what had been promised. God had foreseen something better for us, so that without us they should not be made perfect.

What is most interesting to me in all this is that, although we see references to people who could be called successful in the world’s eyes, the focus is elsewhere. “They acknowledged themselves to be strangers and aliens on earth… they desire a better homeland, a heavenly one… some were tortured… endured mockery… wandered about in deserts.. in caves and crevices of the earth”. These are not people who were successful by the usual worldly standards. These are people who were willing to give up their homeland, their freedom, even their very lives, for a promise of God that would not be fulfilled in its entirety in their lifetimes on earth. These are people who might not seem to be “well-adjusted” by the definition of society as a whole. Yet, “God is not ashamed to be called their God, for He has prepared a city for them”.

When the author of Hebrews turns to Jesus as an example for us to imitate, this is what we read:

…while keeping our eyes fixed on Jesus, the leader and perfecter of faith. For the sake of the joy that lay before him he endured the cross, despising its shame, and has taken his seat at the right of the throne of God.Consider how he endured such opposition from sinners, in order that you may not grow weary and lose heart.

Again, the focus is on imitating the way that Jesus perseveres and is faithful through opposition, suffering and death.  It is easy to persevere when all are on your side. When you have to make a choice and persevere by faith, then we need the encouragement of this cloud of witnesses and the grace and strength that come from Jesus Himself.

From our perspective, many centuries later, we can add more people to this cloud of witnesses. We can point to the Apostles and others in the New Testament who gave witness to their faith. We can point to saints of every generation, from the martyrs who died in the Roman persecutions to recently canonized saints. Many of us have patron saints of our own whose lives inspire and challenge us.

Now, this cloud of witnesses is not made up only of people who have died in years past. There are people, living among us now, who are also part of that cloud of witnesses. Their lives encourage and challenge us in the same way that the saints of long ago do. Who are these people who make up this living cloud of witnesses? We all know people who strike us as holy, as living examples of faith, hope and love, as living Beatitudes among us. Among these, I want to single out for your consideration a specific group of people within this cloud of witnesses. I am talking about autistic people as well as others who tend to be loners and outsiders.

Autistic people often feel like “strangers and aliens on earth” who “desire a better homeland”. They do not strike most people as being “well-adjusted” in the usual sense. Others tend to see their social awkwardness as pathological, as something that needs help. Yes, there is some truth in this. However, that very social awkwardness serves as a reminder to everyone that we are all “strangers and aliens on earth” who “desire a better homeland”. Autistic people witness to everyone that this present world is not our ultimate home. If we are to be “well-adjusted”, it is not to this world but to the homeland that the Lord offers us, a homeland that we already perceive in faith. Autistic people, by their social aloofness, are a prophetic witness to everyone of all that the Letter to the Hebrews has to say.  Remember the old story of the canaries in the mines. Autistic people are simply more sensitive than most to the transitoriness of earthly life and the need for faith in the Lord who leads us to our permanent homeland.

I want to point out one more line in what I quoted previously from Hebrews: “without us they should not be made perfect.” In the original context, this refers to how this cloud of witnesses from the Old Testament never saw the complete fulfillment of God’s promises in their earthly lives, but looked forward to its fulfillment in Jesus and in Christians.  How would it apply to my description of autistic people as important members of the living cloud of witnesses today?

As I said previously, autistic people feel more than most that sense of being wanderers on Earth and looking forward to a better homeland. This is true for all Catholics, all Christians. However, part of our calling as Catholic Christians is to be, here and now, a sign of what that future homeland will look like. We do not have only the grace and the vocation to point forward to the New Jerusalem. people who see how we live as Catholic communities should see some sign of the New Jerusalem already here among us.  Autistic people, like all Catholics, seek that heavenly homeland. The Catholic community as a whole has a vocation to show autistic people concrete signs that the homeland they seek is already here, among us, as Catholics, by the grace of God.

How can Catholic communities do this? They do this by reaching out to their autistic brothers and sisters. They get to know them, learn what their needs are, and seek to make Catholic communities homelands for their autistic brothers and sisters, as much as they possibly can. Autistic lives matter, too.  In this way, the grace of the Lord can grow on autistic people just as it does for all Catholics.  They can find their homeland, already present (even if imperfectly) in Catholic communities who welcome them, and can look forward in hope to the full attainment of this homeland in the Lord, beyond this present life.

All these (lived and) died in faith. They did not receive what had been promised but saw it and greeted it from afar and acknowledged themselves to be strangers and aliens on earth,  for those who speak thus show that they are seeking a homeland. If they had been thinking of the land from which they had come, they would have had opportunity to return. But now they desire a better homeland, a heavenly one. Therefore, God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them.

From The Anchorite: An Open Letter To My Beloved Church

An Open Letter To My Beloved Church

By Fr. Mark Nolette

 

To all Catholics, and all people of good will: May grace and peace be yours from the Father, through the Son, in the unity of the Holy Spirit!

I am an autistic Catholic priest.

My unusual identity gives a particular twist to how I am called to live out my priesthood. In the ancient world, one of the images used to describe the priest was pontifex, Latin for bridge-buulder. We still use this term when we refer to the Pope as the Supreme Pontiff. The role of the priest was seen as building a bridge between divinity and humanity. Since Jesus Christ, by His Passion, Death, and Resurrection, reconciled us to the Father in the Spirit, He became known as the true High Priest, the ultimate bridge-builder between God and humanity.  All Catholic priests, from that time on, have been given a share in His work of bridge-building. Some exercise this in parish ministry. Others serve as hospital or prison chaplains. Still others dedicate themselves to specific groups of people who are in need of shepherds and bridge-builders.

I had been in parish ministry until the effects of my autism and my growing sense of a calling to devote myself to a more contemplative form of priesthood led me to retire from parish ministry. However, my calling to build bridges remains. The Lord has shown me that an important part of my vocation now is to be a bridge-builder between the Lord, the Church, and autistic people. I seek to do this through this blog.  I seek to do this through the Autism Consecrated website. I seek to do this through a life devoted to prayer as a contemplative hermit in the Lord’s presence. It is in this role as bridge-builder that I address you now.

Autism is considered to be a disabling condition. If you are diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder and meet certain criteria, you can qualify for Social Security Disability in the United States. As a nation and as a Church, we still struggle to make our churches and public spaces accessible to people with disabilities in general. Many of our churches may have wheelchair ramps. Some may have people who can interpret the words of the Mass in sign language for our deaf members. It’s the rare parish that offers more than this.

What about the needs of autistic Catholics? Most of the books written (so far) on autism and Church have been written by Protestants.  Those written by Catholics are chiefly focused on how to adapt a faith formation curriculum for autistic children.  People forget that those children grow up! A few parishes have set up “sensory-friendly” rooms (anti-cry rooms, so to speak), separate from the main worship area. These rooms feature (ideally) softer lighting, lower audio volume, and a TV screen for watching Mass.  Having spent time in one, I can say that such rooms cut both ways. On the one hand, they are a positive help. On the other, people who use these rooms are easily forgotten by the parish community, even its leaders, because they are unseen. A few dioceses are trying “sensory-friendly Masses”. These are Masses in parish churches, in their usual worship space, which feature lower audio volume, softer lighting, and other tweaks. These Masses are a step in the right direction.

The biggest challenge, however, isn’t about buildings or programs or even sensory input. It’s about attitude. Do you want us? Do you, my dear fellow Catholics, want us autistic Catholics as part of your faith communities? If the attitude is there, the rest will follow.

This is an extremely important question. One recent survey has shown that over 80% of autistic Christians (Catholic, Protestant and Orthodox) do not attend services in their local churches. This is the highest percentage of non-attendance of any group with a disability that still leaves them capable of going to church. Slipping into my logical brain, I would assume that this statistic alone would make autistic Catholics (and other autistic people) a prime focus of the New Evangelization. I would assume that this would make autistic Catholics an ideal target for the New Apologetics that Bishop Robert Barron and his Word on Fire community speak about. The harvest is indeed rich. Where are the laborers?

When I could see that I could no longer do parish ministry, I proposed to officials in my diocese that I could be a consultant or liaison for ministry to autistic people in my diocese. No one showed interest in this. Diocesan officials say that the local parishes should do something about this. Local parishes say that they lack the resources for this.

That is not all. I regularly hear from autistic people who have tried to connect with their parishes and find that they are ignored, their needs minimized, and their behaviors (over which they may have little control) ridiculed or mocked – even by pastors and lay parish leaders. Many autistic Catholics end up feeling like they have to pastor themselves. Is this right? Is this what Christ had in mind for His Church?

It doesn’t help that autism is seen by many as a “mental illness”. Even in 2022, when people see the term “mental illness”, they are much more likely to think of serial killers and mass shootings than the story of a group of Down’s Syndrome adults who had a foot race in a Paralympics.  The ones who took the lead then slowed down so that all the runners could cross the finish line together and win together.

Let me be blunt. If we autistic people were all wealthy, parishes and dioceses would beat a path to our doors. If we were members of a favored group in our culture, some Church ministers would reach out to us, if only to score points with society as a whole. Far too often, Church leaders take their cues (even without realizing it) from the prevailing cultural standards and not from the Gospel. We matter only if the surrounding culture says that we matter.

The Gospel has a different narrative to propose to us. Christ offers us the parable of the man who had a hundred sheep. One of them runs off. In first-century Palestine, anyone wealthy enough to have a hundred sheep could easily replace the missing one. Yet the shepherd leaves the ninety-nine in search of this one sheep that had no worldly value.

Saint Paul gives us more guidance. The community he founded in Corinth was beginning to think highly of itself from a worldly point of view. They believed that they had “made it” in the world, and looked down on those (even of their own Christian community) who had no worldly status. Saint Paul reminded them, first of all, that most of them had little worldly status when they first embraced the faith. Moreover, they are now members of the Church, the Body of Christ, where all cultural values are inverted. Those who seem to be worthless in the culture’s eyes are all the more valued by Christ and should be all the more honored by all His disciples.  Every Catholic community, from then until now, shows its understanding of the Gospel by how they love those people who are deemed to be lowest in the society around them.

Autistic people, at first glance, may not seem attractive or promising candidates for a Catholic community. We have trouble reaching out and expressing our feelings, even feelings of love. We may seem cold and uncaring to those who do not know us. We can move in odd, repetitive ways, make sounds unexpectedly, or have meltdowns in public. We wear headphones to church to protect us from the audio volume (which may be too loud even for you) and we are accused of disrespect as you assume we’re listening to music.

If there is anything you can learn about us, let it be this. We are like you in many ways.  The things that bother you, bother us. Where we differ from you is not in kind, but in intensity. Imagine an equalizer. In some areas, our settings are like yours. In others, the settings are turned way up – or way down. Some of us are extremely sensitive to sounds, or colors, or certain smells or the feel of certain things. Some of us are very sensitive to inconsistencies and incongruities and cognitive dissonance. If you claim to believe one thing and live another, we see it immediately.  Given our lack of social skills, we might even say so.  This may not ingratiate us to you!

Nevertheless, we have souls and hearts.  We are human beings. Christ died for us as He did for you. Our salvation is as important as yours.  The fact that we are human, like you, should be more than enough for you to reach out to us and work with us to help us become part of our Catholic communities as best we can.

Now I’ll let you in on a little secret. We have a special gift that comes from being autistic. Think of the odd behaviors we may exhibit – the movements, the noises, the meltdowns, the anxieties. Some of these, at least, are in fact given to us for the community as a whole. How so, you ask?

Think of the old story of how miners would bring caged canaries with them into the mines. The canaries were more sensitive to poisonous gases than the miners, so the gases affected the canaries first. When the miners saw this, they knew they had to leave that mine, and quickly.  In the same way, if an autistic person reacts very strongly to the sound volume, or to poor sound quality, this is a problem that will affect everyone eventually. Rather than blame the autistic person, look at the problem this person perceives. If an autistic teenager can’t deal with youth ministry as most parishes do it, maybe the problem is with the way youth ministry is done. I read about a teacher who decided, as an experiment, to change the way she ran her classroom to accommodate her two autistic students.  When she did so, she found that everyone did better, not only the autistic students.

What the world deems foolish is often wisdom before God.

There is much more I can say; much more I can offer in regard to all this.  If you want to pursue this, you’ll find some other posts in my blog and a lot of the material in Autism Consecrated to be most helpful.  Please remember: Christ died for us autistic people, too!

May the Lord generously bless all of you, all that you do and all that you are!

Father Mark

The Anchorite: Such a Deal!!! (Seventeenth Sunday in Ordinary Time – C)

by Father Mark Nolette

In last Sunday’s episode from The Adventures of Abraham, we found him sitting in the shade of a tree near his encampment as the day is growing hot.  He sees three men nearby, not coming to him but on a journey elsewhere. Abraham runs to the three men, practically begging them to give him the honor of allowing him to give them food and drink. Abraham knows well that a journey in the hot sun could be perilous.  They would need food and water to survive.  Abraham provides the nourishment.  His guests in turn, promise him that he and his wife Sarah, in spite of their advanced years, would have a son by this time next year.

In this Sunday’s episode, two of the men move on.  The third, now revealed as the Lord, decides to tell Abraham the purpose of this journey.  The people of Sodom have been accused of serious sins.  The Lord means to find out if the accusations are true and then to pass judgment on Sodom.

By this point in the story, we may be asking questions based on our Catholic doctrine about God.  If this is God, wouldn’t He already know about the evils committed in Sodom? Wouldn’t He know what He was going to do? What’s the purpose of His conversation with Abraham in the first place?  If we recall that God is beyond the boundaries of space and time, that raises still more questions for us.  How do we resolve this? Where do we find light to help us?

This story of the Lord and Abraham is similar to many of Jesus’ parables in that  it’s the story as a whole that tells us something important about God and humanity.  The picture that emerges from the entire story is the focus.  All the details are brushstrokes that paint a multilayered portrait that repays our contemplative gaze.

What can we see in this story?

First, we have Abraham, the man of faith. He proved ready, at God’s invitation, to leave everything he knew to walk toward a future that was impossible by any human standard. Abraham, having emptied himself of nearly everything, was open to God in a profound way. God then takes Abraham into His own heart, His own confidence.  Abraham is invited to be a part of God’s own inner conversation, so to speak.  God is not offended when Abraham raises questions.  In fact God seems to want these questions.  In how Abraham responds, he shows himself to be a man after God’s own heart, a Beloved of God.  Abraham speaks what is already in the Heart of God.

Then there is the conversation itself.  Abraham believes that God intends to destroy Sodom for its evils. Abraham objects that God should not treat the innocent and the guilty in the same way. “Lord”, he asks, “if there are fifty innocent people in Sodom, will you still destroy it?” The conversation goes on, until God affirms that if He finds even ten innocent people in Sodom, He will not destroy the city.

This reminds us of Jesus’ parable of the weeds and the wheat.  In that parable, the landowner does not want the workers to uproot the weeds for fear that the wheat will also perish.  Both must grow together until the harvest. We can also recall Jesus’ journey to Jerusalem, and how a Samaritan village would not welcome Him because He was on His way to Jerusalem. Jesus’ disciples wanted to destroy the village for this, but Jesus rebuked them and moved on.

The story in our Abraham saga, then, affirms that God will not destroy willy-nilly because of the sins of the people.  He will offer grace and mercy.  If only ten good people can be found in the city, God will spare it.  In the same way, God does not desire any one of us to perish, no matter what our sins may have been.  If He finds even a small amount of goodness, faith the size of a mustard seed, He will forgive and offer new life.

God’s mercy is not the only part of the story.  There is also God’s justice.  As it happens, God does not find even ten innocent people in Sodom. For the sake of Abraham, God does rescue Lot and Lot’s family before destroying the city.  It is as though Sodom as a whole had rejected God completely.. Yet, it is unclear whether or not Lot is among the innocent or the guilty.  He resists the call to leave Sodom and has to be practically forced out.  His wife is too attached to Sodom and she perishes. Their daughters do not act in an exemplary way, either.  Yet God offered them one more chance.

Let’s return to our story of God and Abraham one last time. God will spare the whole city for the sake of fifty, forty, or even only ten good people. Suppose that there were fifty, forty or even only ten good people in Sodom. They would not be following the example of the others. Their beliefs score poorly on all the Sodomese opinion polls. These few people would be looked down upon, despised, by their neighbors.  Nevertheless, the city’s survival depends on these few holy ones.

Those of you who are autistic or who have some other disability may see yourselves here. You are too often ignored, even despised. Even churches organize their liturgies and their ministries with scarcely a thought to your needs, unless they are forced to do so.  You may have been told, in many ways, that you have little of value to offer.

What if this city… this parish… this country… this world exists only because the Lord loves you so much that he will show mercy on all because of you?

The COVID-19 Zone -Or- How We Learn To Stop Worrying and Surrender to Love

by Father Mark P. Nolette

 

We are about to begin Holy Week.

April is Autism Awareness Month.

We are in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic.

All three realities converge for us now.  What do they have to do with one another? Nothing… and everything.   The pandemic, and our responses to it, have brought us to a crisis moment as the People of God.  There is hope on the horizon – an immense, brilliant hope, hidden in Christ but offered to us now.  Before we can perceive this hope, we must acknowledge our situation as it is. This will be very difficult for many.  It entails seeing things in a manner differently than the world as a whole sees things.  That is why we need to look to autistic people – people who habitually see things differently; people who are not fooled by ‘spin’ – as an example of what this means and how it can work.  It is the hour when people who appear to be of no use – such as autistic people and contemplatives – may have something valuable to share with everyone else.

Let us begin.

We Americans like to define ourselves by what we do.  We feel better about ourselves when we can tell others how busy we are.  We may complain about it, but we also pride ourselves in it. We define others by how well they can adapt to our culture of busyness.  We speak of those who cannot keep up as “dis-abled”. We do not respect those who choose to order their lives differently.  We plan and fill the hours of our days, our work time and play time.  When we must physically stop, we fill the space around us with movies, TV shows, games, and conversation.  Our culture of busyness also provides us with the illusion that we are in control of our lives.  We have calendars; we have meetings; we have detailed plans and agendas.  We have life by the throat – or so we like to think.

Enter COVID-19.

This virus and the methods we have chosen to slow its spread have upended our usual sense of busyness and control.  A sense of loss and absence is pervasive. Schools and colleges have either gone to online learning or are shut down completely.  Some people must work from home, while others have lost their jobs. Social distancing makes it more difficult to connect with friends and family.  Restaurants, movie theaters, museums, and even many parks are closed. Professional sports leagues have cancelled games. Clubs and other social groups have cancelled or postponed activities.  The way we shop for groceries has changed.  Most states currently have stay-at-home orders in effect for their people.  We now find that we have more time on our hands and fewer ways to spend that time.  We miss the easy familiarity of friends and relatives.  We fear the loss of control.  We feel as though we are now in a Twilight Zone episode where everything looks the same on the outside, but our lives have changed profoundly.  We do not know how long these changes will last, or how many of us may end up with coronavirus.  Where we once knew busyness and control, we now find absence and emptiness.

Absence is suddenly all we see, starting with our own removal from where we normally go.  We basically agree that it is a concession, a sacrifice, for a greater good; and then, we seek to fill the space.  To lessen the shock of change, we begin finding substitutions to approximate what is missing.  Restaurants closed?  Then, we can order takeout!  Housebound for the evening?  Movie marathon!  Meetings cancelled?  Video conferencing!  Birthday party?  Neighborhood greetings on parade, viewed from the safety of your window!  After a while, this improvisation becomes a badge for the war effort. We cheer each other on as we prove that we can overcome any loss with enough creativity and imagination.  Yet, we cannot help but detect the scent of cognitive dissonance in all this.  All these actions are substitutes, desperate attempts to convince ourselves that life goes on as usual – except that it isn’t.  And we know it.

We look to our Church for help and guidance. In official statements from diocese to diocese, we find instead a reflection of what we see everywhere else, written with such consistency from one diocese to the next that we wonder if there is a template that everyone is passing around.  First, we find absence – an absence that we are told, regrettably, is necessary as a response to COVID-19: no public Masses, few if any Sacraments publicly celebrated (or celebrated at all), devotions and other public gatherings cancelled; church buildings in many (but not all) dioceses locked 24/7. Yet, these same official statements assure us that all is well and in control.  The work of the Church continues, we are told.  We are encouraged to watch livestreamed Masses and make prayers of spiritual communion.  Yet again, if we are open, we will catch the scent of cognitive dissonance.  The work of the Church is not continuing as it should – and we all know it.

Something is missing here.  Something is not being spoken or acknowledged.  Until we can fully acknowledge where we are, we cannot know which way we should go from here to move forward.  What is missing?

If all we do is attempt to replace one form of busyness with another, we learn nothing. If all we do is try to maintain the illusion that we are in control, we see nothing.

An artist or an architect might tell us that what we are missing is negative space or, more precisely, what only negative space can reveal.  Negative space – those areas deliberately kept empty – is as essential as every visible color, line and element in any work of art.  The use of space in a painting helps us see the subject as the artist intends.  Pauses bring out the melody in a musical piece.  Silent moments are a necessary part of any good conversation.  Negative space reveals a depth of meaning that color or sound or shape alone cannot offer.  If the artist filled all negative space, the work would suffer and even become incomprehensible.  Negative space, then, is necessary in art and in life.

How does this concept of negative space enter our discussion of the COVID-19 crisis and how we as a Church can see it and respond to it?

In the Christian spiritual life, we have a term for negative space.  We call it contemplation. Contemplation is a long, loving look at the real. Because it is a loving look, it means that we see things through the eyes of God.  Because it is a long look, it means that, in order to have that loving, divine perspective, we must create negative space in our hearts and minds.  We let go of control and power so that we can look around us with open eyes and humble, loving hearts.  Contemplation, or Christian negative space, reminds us that God’s ways are not our ways, that we are all blinded by the world, and that we can only see once we see the truth in love, as God knows it to be.  This can only be given us by God as a grace.  We cannot control it or set its agenda.  We receive it, and then we offer it to all.

Here we must add a warning. Some people have the impression that contemplation should always yield peace of mind; that it is a method to calm fears and anxieties.  Not necessarily.  Christian contemplation sees what really is with the eyes of love.  In this case, we may fear what we might see.  We see absence.  Emptiness.  But it’s not a neutral emptiness.  We would not fear that so much.  In that empty space, we perceive pain.

What pain do we perceive?  There is the pain of the hundreds of thousands who have COVID-19 and the thousands who are dying of it.  There is the pain of hundreds of thousands of others who have other afflictions that we might be ignoring now.  There is the pain brought about by social distancing and the lack of human touch.  There is the fear of what this pandemic will mean for everyone.  There is the pain of separation from Mass, the Sacraments, and especially the Eucharist.

All these are our pains.  But can we speak of a pain in the very heart of God? Does God not in some mysterious way share our burdens? Does God not know the suffering of those who are ill with COVID-19, or any other illness? Does God not know the pain of social isolation, or anxiety, or uncertainty? When we no longer offer one another the Sacraments – those extremely precious gifts of God to us – have we not, in a sense, spurned God by rejecting His gifts? Does our lack of faith and courage also cause God pain, in that our fears become an obstacle to His love and mercy?

When we stand in the love of God, we have the courage to face all such pain.  Where do we go from here?  Where does hope enter in?

The Scriptures show us.  Faced with such overwhelming pain, people in the Scriptures lament.  We see it in the Psalms, first of all.  We see it in the prophets.  Jesus weeps and laments over Jerusalem for its inability to recognize what the Father was offering it through Him.  So must we lament.

What should we lament?  We lament the pandemic itself and the great suffering it has caused to so many around the world.  We lament the effects of the measures taken to try to curb the pandemic – the social separation, the loss of jobs, the weakening of a sense of community, the loss of access even to many of the Sacraments.  We lament our refusal to pause our busyness long enough to gaze upon the world with that long, loving look of contemplation.  We lament how we have treated those who God has sent to show the rest of us how to do this. Since we find lamentation in the Scriptures, we can be assured that the Lord also laments for all these things and more.

Just as many of the lamentation psalms ended in expressions of hope, so, too, hope can truly enter once we have seen with open eyes what is going on, allowed ourselves to feel the pain, and lamented it.  Then, and only then, do we know where we truly are.  Then, and only then, can the Lord reach us.  Recall that His power is best manifested in what the world calls weakness. Foolishness. Failure.  Nowhere is this better manifested for us than in the events we are about to commemorate during Holy Week.

Only when we have seen things as they are and lamented them fully can we be truly open to the Lord’s voice in our hearts.  Only then can we discover what the Lord has planned for us – a future full of hope and joy.  But this future will not come from our own efforts.  It will be a gift of God.  Living that gift will take plenty of effort, of course.  But the gift will make the effort possible.

Where do we go from here? Only the Lord can fully answer that question, if we are serious about trusting Him and loving Him with all our being.  Yet, we can say this as a beginning.

First of all, the COVID-19 crisis reminds us that we are not in control and that our plans cannot account for everything.  We need something else to add to the mix: we need contemplation.  We need that ongoing long, loving look at the real.  We need to value it in our lives and live it when we can.  We need to value those whom the Lord has called to devote their lives totally to this.  We can now see that contemplation is as valuable as action, for action loses its purpose without the negative space of contemplation.

Secondly, we find ourselves struggling to maintain contact with people we like and love.  We are challenged by the constraints of social distancing.  We feel the uncertainty of a crisis over which we feel little control.  All our normal routines are disrupted.  Can anyone help us with all this? Who knows how to live such lives? Might it not be the autistic people among us, who have always felt socially distant and challenged? Autistic people, who have always struggled to connect emotionally with people they love? Autistic people, who often feel overwhelmed by life and who try to maintain daily routines? Might this be the moment when autistic people can share their hard-earned wisdom and experience with the world?

Finally, we are about to celebrate Holy Week.  This is the week where Jesus made Himself negative space; where He emptied Himself completely, giving His life for us and giving us the Eucharist as the ultimate Sacrament of His presence among us.  This would be an excellent time to practice the art of negative space, the art of contemplation, of a long, loving look at the real.  Set aside times during Holy Week when you can tune out everything, both outside yourself and within, and say to the Lord, “Here I am!”  Be ready to share His love and His sorrow; His joy and His pain.  It is all a part of Love.  It is all a part of how Love will bring you, by love, to Love.

A Word from Father Mark Nolette

(Ordinarily, Father Mark Nolette’s posts appear on his blog, The Anchorite.  If you have not yet seen his page or subscribed to his blog, it is well worth checking out.  Since his post today offers very timely support and validation for the autistic community, I am cross-posting here.  – Aimee O’Connell)

I begin with a statistic.  The New York Times reported this morning that the number of confirmed cases of COVID-19 worldwide, as of yesterday, is 160,000.  About half of these are in China.  On the one hand, if we focus on this number only, it seems rather small compared to the total population of the planet, which is estimated at over seven billion people.  This number is, for the moment, far smaller than the number of people who are infected with a typical late winter flu outbreak.  However, that’s not the number that has experts worried.  They believe that the number of cases will explode geometrically, becoming many times that number before the outbreak peaks.

How many times?

There we find a difference of opinion.  Last week, the New York Times reported on four possible scenarios for how many people in this country could be infected with coronavirus, and how many could die.  The estimates of infection range from 15% to 50% of the population.  The number of deaths range from 500k to 2 million.  The experts acknowledge that containment efforts, if applied, could reduce these estimates.  Moreover, because coronavirus is novel, no one knows if some people might have some immunity to it or not.

The fear we are feeling is not so much about the numbers of people who now have it, a number we can safely estimate.  The fear is about the uncertainty of how many people will eventually get it, and how bad it will be.  Moreover, given that a sizable number of people in this country do not trust scientific or medical experts, that compounds the uncertainty.  Moreover, the very existence of this virus among us makes us feel vulnerable.  All the king’s horses and all the king’s men (and all the king’s money) cannot drive it away.  No wall can keep it out.  We Americans are not used to feeling vulnerable.  This only heightens the anxiety.

What do we have, then? A grave level of fear and anxiety.  An overwhelming sense of impending doom. People grasping at any straw, even to the point of stockpiling toilet paper, in order to feel some sense of security or preparedness.  A sense of panic that may be more severe than the virus itself.

Welcome to the world of autistic people.

What I am seeing, as a priest and an autistic person, looks very much like autistic anxiety.  Some of the reactions I see look very much to me like autistic meltdown.  The anxiety I often feel before a weekend liturgy is something like this.  The anxiety I feel when something unexpected, like a funeral, enters my life is something like this.  The anxiety I feel when some future plan is still uncertain is something like this.  As an autistic person, I have needed to grapple with anxieties like these, learn to decipher them, and learn to live with them.  Therefore, I may be able to offer something from my experience as an autistic person that could help many other people during these trying times.

What have I learned that may be of help to others?

1) Things are not as bad as they feel. Yes, I am well aware of the danger of minimizing the risk of coronavirus. However, my sense is that the opposite is the greater danger; that people will panic and make the danger more than it really is.  Then, with panic in control, people do not think well. They may make choices that make the situation worse.  They may look for people to blame.  Sometimes, when I am celebrating Mass, it can feel as though I were the deer and the congregation were all hunters.  Now, there’s a kernel of truth in this. Social exposure of this kind is difficult for me.  However, it’s not quite as bad as it might feel for me at that moment.  In the same way, coronavirus is a real danger, but it’s not quite as bad as our panic might make it out to be.

2) We are not powerless. When anxiety becomes panic, we feel overwhelmed. We feel that we have no control, no options.  We learn to step back when this happens and remind ourselves that this is not true.  As an autistic person, I know that there are ways to manage anxiety.  There are also ways to address the outbreak and reduce the risk.  In managing anxiety, there are techniques like cognitive behavioral therapy, which help us examine our thoughts and see if they correspond to what really is.  Many people find that a few moments with camomile tea helps them soothe their nerves and be recollected.  Then, when anxiety and panic are more manageable, we can look at the actual situation and take appropriate action.  There are ways to significantly reduce our risk of catching or spreading coronavirus.

3) We must never deny or ignore our needs. This COVID-19 outbreak reminds us of our fundamental vulnerability as human beings.  We may find it difficult to acknowledge this vulnerability, to ourselves or to others.  We may feel the overwhelming temptation to camouflage those weak spots at all costs.  As an autistic person, I am well aware of my own vulnerabilities and limitations, especially in social situations.  Nevertheless, I have found that the stronger and more courageous thing to do is to acknowledge those vulnerabilities to myself and to others.  Paradoxically, this unlocks a strength in me and in others that makes all of us stronger.  Acknowledging our legitimate needs, and drawing healthy boundaries, are essential for our health and survival.  This is all the more true in the stressful situation we now find ourselves in.

4) We are not alone. Perhaps the greatest danger when we feel overwhelmed with intense anxieties, panic, or depression is the sense that each one of us is alone in this.  No one else could understand, we tell ourselves.  In this kind of isolation, we feel weaker.  We become easier prey to panic, depression and despair.  As an autistic person, I grew up with a profound sense of being “different” without being able to name that difference.  There were things about me that others could not understand, and there were things about others that I could not understand.  Though there is truth in this, there is also a danger – the danger of feeling ultimately alone in a dangerous world.  When I find others who share some of these attributes with me, I know I am not alone.  It is important for us all to share our anxieties and concerns with others so that we know we are not alone.

5) We are saved by Love.  Everything I have tried to say is summed up here.  It is Love that saves us.  It is Love that empowers us.  It is Love that assures us, above all, that we are not alone.  It is Love that we need more than any other thing.  And this Love is God.  As an autistic child, I felt more withdrawn from other people than I do now.  The first things to reach me were what some call “special interests” – my love for astronomy, dinosaurs, history, and many other things I began to discover.  Caught up in love for these things, I could easily talk your ear off, whereas I’d be silent most of the time otherwise.  Some see these interests as excessive and pathological.  Not necessarily.  They are meant, for the autistic person, to be a training ground for love.  Learning how to love these things helps us begin to love other people and, ultimately, to love God with that same total devotion that flows from the very marrow of our bones and the very cardiac tissue of our hearts.  All of us, faced with the fears caused by this outbreak, can renew our love for our own interests and, especially, for God who is Love.  It is this Love that ultimately frees us from panic and fear.  We need to do what we can to open ourselves as fully as possible to this Love.

This is why I have argued, and continue to argue, that we need the Sacraments and, especially, the Mass and the Eucharist at this time.  Yes, we should follow flu protocols and take all reasonable precautions to safeguard ourselves and our loved ones.  However, we cannot deny or ignore our need for Love.  Our need for Christ.  He has told us that we need to eat His Flesh and drink His Blood so that we might have the fullness of His life in us.  Christians of past centuries believed that this need was so fundamental that it was worth risking their lives for it.  That has not changed.  We need the Lord, and we need to follow His own teaching of how we can best receive His love.  Who could know this better than Him?

I leave you with this in the hope that my insight – that our experience of this outbreak parallels autistic experience – will be helpful, as well as my sharing of what I have learned from this.  It may be that this outbreak is a time when people who may have been shunned as eccentric or lacking in social graces may have something most valuable to offer the world.

May the love of the Lord be with us, now and always!