Pastoral Relationship with People with Intellectual ... - Theses

61He sees human beings as fundamentally relational in nature. Christianity is thehighest form of religion because it is the one that can best nurture freedom andautonomy. Human beings are fundamentally relational in nature, having beencreated by the Triune God. 122 Therefore, from a theological perspective, theworld is communal. 123 While Hegel does assert that the inability of those withcognitive impairment to live as autonomous beings limits their capacity to beregarded as fully functioning selves, defined in terms of spirit, he does, at thispoint, assert the role of religion. This is the realm of absolute spirit, of narrative,symbol and liturgy, which is accessible to people with cognitive impairment,along with all others. 124 In today’s language, the church becomes a place ofhospitality for all.While Soren Kierkegaard had no concept of ‘disability’ in a contemporarysense he does assert that the one factor to limit the flourishing of all humanbeings is the problem of sin. It is sin that limits self-understanding, impedesrelationships and prevents wholeness of being. 125 In terms of a disabilitydiscourse one of the beneficial outcomes of this fundamental theologicalassertion is that it primarily describes human weakness in terms of relationship tosin, and not in terms of physical abilities and health. This discredits the latersocial tendency to create normalcy divisions on the basis of ableist / disableddistinctions. 126In moving to the twentieth century we see disability theology andecclesiology at the heart of Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s implacable resistance to theNazi regime’s distorted theological idealization of strength and humanprowess, 127 along with its barbaric implementation of a programme of eugenicstowards those deemed ‘weak’. In defence of these marginalised people he asserts:‘Life created and preserved by God possesses an inherent right,122 Brock, "Introduction,” 15.123 Wendte, Martin. "To Develop Relational Autonomy: On Hegel's View of People withDisabilities." In Disability in the Christian Tradition: A Reader, edited by Brian Brock andJohn Swinton, 251-85. Grand Rapids & Cambridge: William B. Eerdmans PublishingCompany, 2012, 258.124 ibid., 262.125 Brittain, Christopher. "Between Necessity and Possibility: Kierkegaard and the Abilitiesand Disabilities of Subjectivity." In Disability in the Christian Tradition: A Reader, edited byBrian Brock and John Swinton, 286-320. Grand Rapids & Cambridge: William B. EerdmansPublishing Company, 2012, 288-89.126 ibid., 289-90.127 Brock, "Introduction,” 16-17.