The Greenup Family

Another post I read added at least two more thoughts to the discussion, but I still feel that it is a tough matter, that can’t be discerned from afar.

1. “If our children cannot find acceptance and tolerance in church, where would they ever find these? If they are not welcome in their Father’s house, where else would they be?”

2. “Allegedly, Adam had not only been disruptive, but violent as well. But you know what? My son can be that way, too. And given what we know of our son, given what we have learned from our years of living with and loving him, I still feel that he should NEVER ever be deprived of his chance to worship”

The first of these points is right on, and should be wholeheartedly supported.  The second has serious issues.  At the base of it is “Your right to extend your arm stops where it meets my face.”  Somewhere between these two positions, a middle ground has to be found autistic people should be welcome in the church, and they frequently are not, but that doesn’t mean you should go over the top to the other side either.  I note that the posts I saw that were most outraged about the church were made by people who claim to have autistic children themselves.  Do they hold the position because they have more intimate knowledge of autism, or because they are a member of the set themselves?  I am not trying to argue ad homiem, but am trying to see through all of the issues involved.

Additional thoughts

What if a naturalist came and charged that true worship should be done naked as Adam and Eve did?  How about a holy roller in a catholic church?  Where is the line between authentic enthusiastic worship and distraction to other people’s attempts to do so in their own way?

Love Love Love.  All should be in love, but unfortunately, we’ve got Earth, Earth, Earth, so it’s a little tricky.

A post at Floating Axehead about an autistic child and trouble in a church really stirred me up this morning. (added: news article here) There are so many troubling issues here.

On the church’s side:

• The child DOES seem to be a danger. The article mentions that “after one service Adam got into another family’s car, started it and revved up the engine while there were people in front of the vehicle.”
• The family has a separate study room in their home so that he is not disruptive to the other family members and their things. The family should be receptive to the church’s attempts to work out a solution.

On the family’s side:

• Kids fight. hitting another kid (who may also be large) may not be a big deal.
• Lack of control over his bodily functions, or panicing and racing from the church are not things that are wrong or that he should be punished for.
• Do the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) restrictions on discrimination apply?

On the Misc side:

I laughed (nervously) at the part about comparing watching a video feed in another room being similar to everyone staying home and watching the service on TV. I think (hope) this is a case of arguing the extreme; Just because some things are necessary, expedient, appropriate, or efficient for some, does not mean that they are for all. The extreme of “everyone staying home and watching the service on TV” is Isaac Asimov’s society of the Solarians, where nobody ever came into the same building together, but always “screened” one another. As someone who works from home and likes to shop online, I’m already a little sensitive on this subject.

Another blog quoted Luke, saying: “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them.” I’m not sure this is REALLY ripping out of context, or a valid point. He’s not a LITTLE child, and that was a specific statement in a specific situation, and generalizing it should be done with caution. Still, Especially from a Catholic perspective, this is “coming to Him”, and the restraining order is a classic “hinder”.

This issue highlights how difficult it is to trust anything you hear these days. I am sure that many will only hear “church obtains restraining order against disabled child”. The opposite story “church diciplines family for being unloving to other churchgoers” might be just as wrong. It makes me feel at the mercy of the media (which I don’t trust) because there is no way to gather the correct amount of information about the things I hear. Because I know that the slightest subtleties of wording can influence people in polls, I even have some concern that I have not “neutralized” the title on this blog post, and people scanning RSS feeds will get only those four words about the problem and form a conclusion. Maybe I should have stolen Floating Axhead’s title “Between the Rock and a hard place”

Specifically, though only 10 months old, he’s already helping clean the house:

His Popa is so Proud!

Greer recently had to go without her ba-ba (pacifier) because she broke a rule.  (since she’s four, she is only allowed to have it on her bed.) Except for some crying when going to sleep, (which we sometimes get because of some fit or another anyway) she made it through the night with no problem.  This encouraged Michele greatly because she’s been hoping to get Greer to give it up. So last night when Greer went to bed, Michele offered her pancakes for breakfast as a reward for sleeping without it. (Greer asks for pancakes for breakfast all the time, so this was a special thing for her.)

Later, Michele went up to deal with some crying she heard upstairs.  She asked Greer what the problem was, as she thought she had been clear that Greer could go get her ba-ba if she needed it.  That wasn’t the problem.  Greer explained that she knew she had been a bad girl (reading books, talking, playing) when she was supposed to be going to sleep, and was sad because that would mean she wouldn’t be able to get pancakes in the morning.

It is nice to know that SHE knows when she’s being bad, (even when we don’t actually detect it)  because with all the tantrums and rebellion, she makes my heart ache, and worry that I won’t be able to teach her what is right.  She is very convinced of her own way; I wonder how much God looks at me and cries too?

“I think Pace prefers these Vege crackers to Cheerios. I gave him a couple, and he deliberately took the Cheerio he had been eating out of his mouth, and started gumming the vege cracker”
-Michele, about Pace

Nessa was standing up high on one of our kitchen stools and jumped as far and high as she could across the kitchen.  The resulting faceplant stunned her.  My wife, shocked, was trying to figure out the best way to react when she bounced back up and said “I didn’t break no bones”.

Judging by her expression, though, she’s unlikely to try it again.