Lausanne World Pulse – Themed Articles – Lessons from Our Daughter: Reflections of Church and Ethics

By Daniel and Gayna Salinas
June 2009

The birth of our daughter in November 1993 threw us into the unknown land of disabilities.¹ Our daughter Karis was born with cerebral palsy. Simple tasks were impossible. Eating, getting dressed, brushing her teeth, combing her hair, or using the toilet were out of the question. Karis never walked or sat up by herself. She lived her life strapped to a wheelchair or some other therapy apparatus.

She never talked. Communication was limited to crying and smiling. We never knew her favorite food, her likes or dislikes, or her dreams or feelings. Hundreds of doctors’ and therapist visits punctuated her seven years of life.

Taking a Good Look at Ethics and Society
Slowly, we realized this was wide-open territory. Where was it before? Why had we not seen it? Certainly there were people with disabilities around. What did society do with such people and their families? After visiting three countries, we realized many of these individuals were ignored, institutionalized, or abandoned to public charity. This led us to evaluate our ethics of life and society.

Horrified, we noticed many influential philosophers proposed that these individuals were not even persons and did not have the same rights as “normal people.” Having created the concept of “Quality of Life,” they applied it to people with special needs. The quality of life of these individuals did not reach their criteria, hence, lives could (and even should) be terminated. This included children, elderly, quadriplegics, and fetuses with health or mental problems. Furthermore, ethicists redefined personhood, adding the category of “non-human persons” (basically primates) with the same rights that “human persons” have. Therefore, such “non-human persons” have, according to this philosophy, more right to life than our daughter had.²

Inside the Christian Community
We thought we would find compassion, understanding, empathy, help, and respite in the Christian community; instead, we found the same utilitarian ethics in place as in the secular world. For most believers, there were two options: either God heals the person or God takes the person away. They asked, “What sense does it make to live like that? Isn’t it better that God calls the person home?” Although these seem like innocent questions, behind them rests the same argument secular scholars propose.

These questions reveal the urgent need to seriously evaluate our ethics. The Church, where supposedly the ethics of the Kingdom of God are proposed and practiced, has (consciously or unconsciously) bought into the secular ethics of the day. The Church should be the voice for the voiceless, eyes for the blind, hands for those who cannot produce, and feet for the immobile.

Rather, people with special needs are conspicuously absent from congregations because they cannot contribute, or bring a monetary offering, nor can they help with numerical growth. Some pastors even go as far as telling parents that they are welcomed in church, but without their children.

Think for a moment: how many congregations do you know of with an intentional ministry to special-needs people and their families? How many include simultaneous translation for the deaf? How many Sunday schools include Down syndrome kids? Are there only able-bodied people involved in the leadership of the church? This reality should make us feel somewhat embarrassed. This shows the need for believers to consider ethics seriously.

When Ethics Become Personal
Such an ethical void, or ethical adaptation, became even more acute when our daughter died in January 2001. The death of a child is unnatural; parents are not supposed to bury their children. As believers, death makes us cry out loud, “Let your kingdom come!” Death is our enemy. But, in our case, for most of the believers who came to “comfort” us, our daughter’s death was the best thing that could have happened. She was better off dead. The message was clear: “She is better off now; there is no more suffering and pain.”