Disabilities, baptism, and communion

On another blog the pastor was reminiscing about a time when he had debated with himself about the propriety of baptizing a 15 year old severely autistic child. There were no clear signs that the 15 year old had accepted the Lord, rather his mother requested his baptism after years of attending that congregation. The poster was not the responsible pastor at the time, but rather the youth minister and a seminarian. At that time, his conclusion was that the teenager should not be baptized because he was not able to articulate a “credible and intelligible confession of faith.” In denominations that believe that only believer’s baptism is valid, this would not be an unusual position.

This made me start to think about the Orthodox position. At first I thought that there was no problem since we baptize infants. But, then, I thought, what about adults? After all, the Orthodox are receiving converts all the time. Surely, I thought, among those who come in, there must be some in the same position as that mother. There must be some who come in bringing relatives who are also special needs. Normally we, too, require a “credible and intelligible confession of faith.” But, our view on baptism is different than those who believe in believer’s baptism. By definition, those who believe in infant baptism do not necessarily require a “credible and intelligible confession of faith” from those being baptized. So, what happens when one encounters a non-infant person who is not able to to give the type of confession we routinely–but not necessarily–expect from a non-infant?

Well, I am happy to say that recently the bishops of the Standing Conference of the Canonical Orthodox Bishops in the Americas issued a statement that deals rather well with the subject. I urge you to read it in full, and it is long. Below are several excerpts:

Disability is a daily and, in many ways, a natural occurrence. We are all touched by disability in the form of illness or injury or difficulty at some point in our lives. Since we all hold the treasure of God’s life in fragile earthen vessels (see 2 Cor. 4:7), each of us is vulnerable to disability, whether by circumstance, by genes, by disease, by accident, or by age. . . . Yet a person with a disability is not necessarily handicapped except through physical and attitudinal barriers created by others. Handicaps are in fact the barriers that we create for people with disabilities by excluding them socially and physically.

Thus, in the Church, we learn to honor and to complement one another. However, such completion or perfection (theosis) is always a constant striving, never fully accomplished in this life. For, “just as the body is one and has many members … so it is with Christ.” (1 Cor. 12.12) Indeed, “the parts of the body which seem to be weaker are indispensable.” (1 Cor. 12.22) There are two points that we should notice in St. Paul’s words: first, that certain parts may “seem” weaker, but in fact are not actually weaker; second, that weakness is not the characteristic of an individual but of the entire Church. This means that, when people with disabilities are in any way excluded from our parish life, then the entire body is incomplete. . . Membership differs from mere inclusion in the collective or political sense. We are not a full community without one another. If we exclude or overlook one member, then we do not simply reduce the community; in fact, we inflict injury on the very structure of the Church.

While much of the statement has to do with people with physical disabilities, yet several of the statements also mention those who have special needs. Some of you will read the statement and say that it has a bit of an overload of politically correct language, and that is entirely true. I had to stop reading a time or two just to shake my head at the pile of phrase upon phrase that at times appear to be cut and pasted from someone’s bureaucratic playbook. Nevertheless, if one plows through the verbiage one can read some valuable principles that have some strong Eastern Orthodox foundations.

The Orthodox have always had a strong focus not just on the Death and Resurrection, but also on the Incarnation. One of the thoughts in the statement that made me chuckle was that it was pointed out that the Son of God had essentially become disabled during his time on earth. After all, think of all the human limitations he took on, including the mental limitations of being finite! Thus the Incarnation is not only God coming to dwell among us, but also God choosing to become disabled for our sakes, even unto death on the cross. “Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, Who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross.”

And, yet, in his disabled condition he was baptized and in his disabled condition he died for our sins. So, should those who have a severe mental disability be baptized? Should that person receive the Eucharist? The answer is a clear YES!