Power And Powerlessness In Pentecostal Theology A Review Essay On Amos Yongs Theology And Down Syndrome Reimagining Disability In Late Modernity

Click to join the conversation with over 500,000 Pentecostal believers and scholars

Click to get our FREE MOBILE APP and stay connected

Pneuma 30 (2008) 137-145

Review Essay

Power and Powerlessness in Pentecostal T eology

1

A Review Essay on Amos Yong’s

T eology and Down Syndrome: Reimagining Disability in

Late Modernity

Jeff Hittenberger

a

and Martin William Mittelstadt

b

a) Evangel University, Springfield, Missouri 65802, USA

HittenbergerJ@evangel.edu

b) Evangel University, Springfield, Missouri 65802, USA

MittelstadtM@evangel.edu

Introduction

Hittenberger: When our son Ben was diagnosed with Down Syndrome, we asked God, “What does this mean?” My wife Christine sensed that God was providing this response to our prayer: “In Ben, you will get to see the meaning of the Kingdom of God every day.” This has, in fact, been our experience, as this example will illustrate. On Ben’s first day at a new middle school, we stood together and watched his new classmates exit a special education bus. We heard a girl screaming in anguish. An aide and the driver tried to coax her off the bus. She refused to budge. One of the aides finally carried her off and set her down on the sidewalk, while she continued to scream. She seemed terrified and angry. Ben watched her, but didn’t change his expression. Then the girl seemed to catch a glimpse of Ben from the corner of her eye and there was a flash of recognition. Her screaming stopped and she stood up. She walked over to where we were standing and stood in front of Ben, looking into his eyes. Ben reached out his arms and put them around her shoulders, gave her a big hug,

1

Our reference to the Pentecostal tradition implies the broadest sense of the term from the early twentieth century revivals through to the charismatic renewal of the late twentieth century.

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2008 DOI: 10.1163/157007408X287812

1

138

Review Essay / Pneuma 30 (2008) 137-145

and held her for about ten seconds. She stopped crying. I remembered then that they had been classmates a couple of years earlier. Ben and Elizabeth gathered with their classmates and headed off to middle school. As I walked to my car I thanked God. Ben was here to do his mission. In his powerlessness, God’s power was being displayed. I came to this book hoping to find a theology that would give voice to our experience.

Mittelstadt: I grew up in the Pentecostal tradition. Today, I claim Pentecostalism as my tradition of choice in spite of periodic seasons of disappointment and disil- lusionment. I remain at “home” due in part to my consistent approach to theology as autobiographical: many of my academic aspirations serve to bring meaning and application to my experience. For example, as a response to my struggle with one-sided triumphalism so often dominant within our tradition, I wrote my dissertation on the role of the Spirit in contexts of suffering and persecution in Luke-Acts.2 While my analysis of persecution primarily offered theological solace, my ongoing encounter with Pentecostal triumphalism conflicted with a different kind of suffering closer to home. On a personal level, I recall my ongoing interac- tion with various family members and friends with a wide range of disabilities. I wondered why they are not healed. I pondered the possibilities of their encounter with God. At times, I questioned their value to a family, the church and society. Unfortunately, my participation within Pentecostal churches provided no forum for discussion and, to my own disappointment, I generally refused to initiate dialogue except for the occasional private conversation. But this is changing. As I have recently been diagnosed with epilepsy, I find myself wrestling with personal identity. I remember well my teenage years, when my friends and I would mock peers with seizures (and any kind of physical or intellectual disabilities). Today, while I live among loving and supporting family and friends, I also resonate more with those who are marginalized through no fault of their own.

Like Yong, our interest in disability reflects our own journeys. Yong wrestles not only with personal questions but also provides possibilities for meaningful theological understanding and response.

Synopsis

Amos Yong’s Theology and Down Syndrome is a deeply personal book, motivated in large part by his desire to make sense of his brother Mark’s

2

See Mittelstadt, The Spirit and Suffering in Luke-Acts: Implications for a Pentecostal Pneuma- tology (JPT Sup, 26; London: T & T Clark, 2004).

2

Review Essay / Pneuma 30 (2008) 137-145

139

experience with Down Syndrome. Short vignettes about Mark and his family begin each chapter. What follows each of these vignettes is truly groundbreaking theological reflection on the meaning of Down Syndrome for Christian theology. While many books have been written about dis- ability from the standpoint of Christian belief and experience, few have attempted to address disability, and especially intellectual disability, “within its wider ecclesial, social, political, economic, cosmic, and finally, theologi- cal contexts” (293).3

This book is especially timely given both the exponential growth in inci- dence of diagnosed disabilities, as well as the chilling trend toward termina- tion of pregnancies when children are diagnosed in utero. An estimated 350,000 Americans and perhaps 5 million people worldwide have Down Syndrome (61), a genetic condition that occurs when a third chromosome is linked to the twenty-first pair (hence the name “trisomy 21”). Of parents who receive early diagnosis of Down Syndrome, between 70 and 90 percent choose to abort (64).

Christian theology has largely failed people with disabilities. In Part I of the book, Yong provides a survey of biblical and historical theological perspec- tives. Among his disturbing findings is that, while many theologians are silent on the issue of disabilities, some have asserted that people with intellectual disabilities do not have souls. Given that the imago dei is often associated with rationality, and salvation with theological affirmations, anyone not able to demonstrate rationality or articulate theological beliefs would inevitably be lost. The results of this failure of theology have been devastating for people with disabilities, who have often found the church to be as inhospitable as the world.

Yong argues that, repenting of our past failures, “Christian theological reflection and praxis in the twenty-first century can be invigorated and renewed when the scriptural and dogmatic traditions of the church . . .are retrieved and reinterpreted in close dialogue with disability perspectives”(152). T is reinvig- oration can be accomplished by means of the “pneumatological imagination,” or a means of knowing “shaped in part by the Biblical narratives of the Holy Spirit and in part by the Christian experience of the Spirit” (11). “An approach to theological reflection informed and shaped by the Christian experience of the Holy Spirit,” Yong writes, “not only opens up space for the possibility of dialogue with experiences of disability but also, arguably, requires such a

3

We would especially recommend Henri Nouwen’s Adam: God’s Beloved (New York: Orbis, 1997) and Jean Vanier’s From Brokenness to Community (New Jersey: Paulist Press, 1992).

3

140

Review Essay / Pneuma 30 (2008) 137-145

conversation for Christian theology to maintain its credibility and plausibility in the twenty-first century” (10-11). We will suggest below some specific implications for Pentecostals of Yong’s theological reflections.

In Part II, Yong engages with and summarizes the literatures of multiple disciplines and perspectives on disability issues: medicine, feminism, disability studies, law, economics, and world religions, to name a few. The reference list alone is over 90 pages long, a rich resource for anyone interested in this area of study. Yong finds that the challenge to scientific “objectivity” characterizing what he calls “late modernity” (or postmodernity) has opened the possibility of reinterpreting disability in positive and embracing terms, rather than in the medicalized language of modernism that made all people with disabilities “abnormal” and, ultimately, a burden on society. Disability advocates are sug- gesting possibilities like an “aesthetic of difference” that redefines beauty in inclusive terms, challenging convergent standards of beauty against which people with disabilities are usually measured and found wanting.

In Part III, Yong builds on what he has discovered in the multiple disci- plines to suggest themes for a renewed theology that fully embraces disability. For example, the “aesthetic of difference” resonates with a richer understand- ing of the imago dei, which understands that all people are made in God’s image and are the focus of God’s unconditional love and divine delight. God’s eternal beauty, goodness, wisdom, and love are of such surpassing wonder as to render utterly insignificant any differences among humans to which we might point in order to assert our superiority. Moreover, theologians like Stanley Hauerwas point to Jesus on the cross as the embodiment of disability, utter vulnerability, and complete powerlessness: “the disabled God.” Given that God’s love was revealed on the cross in this most vulnerable form, it could well be that in our world and in our lives, God continues to manifest divine love most profoundly through those who are least able to articulate it. In fact, people with Down Syndrome and other intellectual disabilities often have rich spiritual lives and provide spiritual nurture to those who know them.

Yong includes chapters on the doctrines of creation, providence, and the imago dei, on ecclesiology, soteriology, and eschatology. Each of these chapters offers insights derived from disability that promise to renew Christian think- ing and inspire a deeper appreciation for the wonders of God. Yong raises questions with profound significance for praxis, like how to provide people with profound mental retardation the opportunity for baptism and initiation into the Body of Christ, and how to better liberate the intellectually disabled for ministry in the church. “How is it possible for them to be ministers of

4

Review Essay / Pneuma 30 (2008) 137-145

141

God’s saving and revelatory grace to a hurting world? I suggest that it is espe- cially the severely and profoundly disabled, in part because of their not resist- ing the Spirit, who are most able to be iconic charisms of God’s presence and activity in the world” (p. 218).

Particularly inspiring is Yong’s depiction of the eschatological hope applied to people with disabilities. We have traditionally pictured heaven as a place where all disabilities will be eliminated, where the disabled will be just like us. But are we missing something? “Will I be retarded in heaven?” Yong quotes an anonymous girl’s question to her parents. The parents reassured her that she would be perfect in heaven. “T en how will you know me?” she asked (259). Could it be that Mark and Ben and others with Down Syndrome have received from God a gift that is meant to have significance beyond the present life? Could it be that heaven will not make them more like us, but will make all of us (whatever our disability) more like Christ? “Is it possible to conceive that the glory and power of the resurrection body will derive not from some able- bodied ideal of perfection but from its being the site of the gracious activity of God’s Spirit? In this case, might not the unending journey of the resurrection body also be from glory to glory and from perfection to perfection?” (282).

Pentecostal Implications

While Yong calls the church universal to an enlarged understanding of the intersection of theology and disability, our purpose is to suggest specific implications for the Pentecostal tradition.4 Yong interrogates two core dis- tinctives within Pentecostalism: divine healing and the universal availability of the Holy Spirit for a charismatic community. However, Yong consist- ently supplements his theological interrogations with passionate pastoral appeals.

Yong affirms the Pentecostal pursuit of healing. From the beginning of the movement in the early twentieth century, Pentecostals have attested to innu- merable accounts of God’s intervention through physical healing. At the same time, Yong recognizes that disappointing and dubious practices litter the movement. He not only laments but challenges healing practices that leave the

4

At the same time, we do not want to suggest that the ensuing implications are irrelevant for the larger Christian tradition. We want to focus upon issues that relate directly to Pentecostal theology and praxis.

5

142

Review Essay / Pneuma 30 (2008) 137-145

disabled (as well as families and friends) disappointed and disillusioned when healing fails (242-247). Pentecostals often susceptible to an over-realized eschatology tend to view physical healing as the greatest goal ahead of the need to be loved.5 God’s love, expressed through God’s people, brings about a holis- tic kind of healing that enables a person to realize their human wholeness, even when a physical cure does not follow. Yong’s call for an aesthetic of difference and his affirmation of healing as attainable even in the absence of a cure suggests that an overzealous pursuit of healing can become a form of idolatry.

He counters with an invitation for an enlarged theology of healing. While healing may include cures, agents of healing must include intentional invita- tion to the stranger through love and inclusion. Such activity solicits a thor- ough reexamination of contemporary understandings of the gift of hospitality (Gen 18; Heb 13:2a; Luke 14:15-24). T rough extension of hospitality to those with disabilities, the church not only offers hospitality but also receives hospitality (224). A hospitable church experiences an inexpressibly relational healing reminiscent of the inclusivity modeled on the day of Pentecost.6 Pentecostals also proclaim the universal availability of Spirit-empowerment (Acts 1:8). Pentecostals view the church as a charismatic community empha- sizing the mutuality of body ministry (I Cor 12-14). Unfortunately, Pentecos- tal ministry often focuses on the strong and sensational body parts to the neglect of the weak and necessary sustaining parts of the body (1 Cor: 12:22- 24). Paul, well acquainted with fragility, not only heeds Jesus’ words that “power is made perfect in weakness” (2 Cor 12:9) but also challenges Corin- thian arrogance by placing the foolishness of God against their human wis- dom and the weakness of God to shame their human strength (1 Cor 1:20-2:4). Yong also cites the inauguration of Jesus’ ministry at Nazareth. Jesus reads from Isaiah and declares his own ministry to the poor, the weak and the oppressed (Luke 4:18-19). The cumulative effect of these biblical texts points to the participation of the marginalized in the kingdom of God (204-5; 217-8). Since Pentecostals proclaim the paradigmatic nature of Jesus’ life and desire to recapture the primitive purity and power of the first century church, our imitation of Jesus and our inclusive ecclesiology must not only make

5

For an excellent critique of overzealous pursuit of healing see Gordon Fee’s The Disease of the Health and Wealth Gospels (Vancouver: Regent Publishing, 1985).

6

We recommend Brendan Byrne The Hospitality of God: A Reading of Luke’s Gospel (College- ville: Liturgical Press, 2000).

6

Review Essay / Pneuma 30 (2008) 137-145

143

room, but also supply ministerial opportunities for people with disabilities.7 Yong provides numerous examples of the disabled as able ministers.

On a personal level, he narrates the occasion of Mark’s baptism in the Spirit through the agency of his mother. While Yong’s mother struggles with embar- rassment about Mark’s behavior, an onlooker expresses an opposite response: “She wished that she was as free as Mark to worship God” (228). When asked what he prays for, Mark declares: “for people to get healed,” for “salvation,” and for “one nation under God with liberty and justice for all” (194-5).

At an ecclesial/community level, Yong offers the egalitarian and democratic L’arche, a worldwide fellowship of communities serving the disabled, as an example of a Christian community that embraces weakness over and against “convenience, comfort, consumption, and efficiency” (201). Everyday activi- ties such as rising, dressing, eating, chores, helping, sleeping, praying and dreaming are not only ordinary and mundane, but occasions for the miracu- lous. Yong recounts these stories among many to demonstrate contributions offered by the disabled when given the opportunity.

A Call to Action

Yong follows his regular theological reflections with a consistent call for action. Among the multitude of possible responses for Pentecostals, we sug- gest the following: 1) a reversal of prejudicial practices that run contrary to Pentecostal inclusivity; 2) inclusion of, and creative interdisciplinary research for and with, people with disabilities in our educational institutions; 3) a prophetic model that calls not only for the maintenance of the disabled but the marshalling of all the resources of the church for their flourishing. Yong objects to prejudicial and exploitative practices and not just those that afflict people with disabilities. Yong interrogates inappropriate use of the term “normal” as an ideal and a positive expression against the “grotesque” (86). Contemporary culture is plagued by media images of unattainable physical perfection. The disabled are part of a larger marginalized community that includes all those with imperfect bodies who do not meet the cultural standard of slimness and eternal youth. To the embarrassment of the church, Yong places the adoption of “ableism” alongside racism, classism, and sexism as an oppressive sin in need of intentional repentance. Pentecostals regularly refer to

7

See Grant Wacker, Heaven Below: Early Pentecostals and American Culture (Cambridge: Har- vard University Press, 2001) 11-12.

7

144

Review Essay / Pneuma 30 (2008) 137-145

the events of Acts 2 as a breaking of ethnic, racial and gender barriers. By implication, Yong calls for an enlarged Pentecostal inclusivity through the breaking of a new barrier, namely intentional and authentic hospitality to the disabled.

The steady emergence of the liberal arts in the Pentecostal tradition leads to a second call. Pentecostal institutions need to explore creative possibilities to reflect this inclusivity via pneumatological imagination. Educators in the Arts and Humanities need to explore and promote a new Pentecost by interrogat- ing views that stigmatize, marginalize, and oppress on account of bodily or intellectual differences. Courses in film, literature, theatre and arts could encourage students to counter demeaning presentations of the disabled against the backdrop of ableism (89-90). Interdisciplinary disability studies should draw on philosophy, women’s studies, politics, geography, and economics in order to declare a new Pentecost that seeks to integrate the disabled. Propo- nents of an integrated Pentecostal worldview need to challenge the social mar- ginalization of people with disabilities, unravel ableist or normative notions of uniformity and pave the way for diversity and inclusion (100). Pentecostal institutions must also find ways to creatively include people with disabilities in their student bodies, their staffs and faculty, so as to demonstrate this inclusiv- ity. This will allow for greater engagement in research with and on behalf of people with disabilities so as to penetrate policies and ideologies of our larger societies.

Finally, Yong seeks prophetic marketplace Christians. Yong longs for believ- ers who strive to bring the eschatological age into the present through the transformation of disability approaches from primarily economics-driven maintenance to new resourcing intent on human flourishing. He envisages action that includes further education on alcohol consumption and cigarette smoking during pregnancy, the use of seat belts and helmets to protect against head injuries that cause retardation as well as lobbying for the reduction of lead in paints and in gasoline. He laments the limited availability of vaccines for measles, smallpox, polio, and other diseases that can cause retardation. Yong challenges oppressive answers to Down Syndrome such as selective abor- tion and calls for stronger focus upon early intervention, educational pro- grams, and environmental modification (66). Yong decries the lucrative market of therapeutic interventions and behavior modification as a microcosm of an overarching capitalist order, when the profit motive is unchecked by funda- mental moral values that put people first. While Yong does not deny the need for ongoing research into medical and psychological intervention, he calls

8

Review Essay / Pneuma 30 (2008) 137-145

145

upon the church to balance preventive and maintenance-based responses with religious resources that encourage community and foster human flourishing. In this way, the church may initiate a prophetic model of libera- tion to the poor and oppressed by counteracting the well-oiled psychiatric machine (254-5).

Evaluation

Since this text is vintage Yong, it requires careful reading. Yong utilizes not only exegetical, historical, and theological insights but also interdisciplinary breadth that may be challenging for some readers. His integration of theology with the social and behavioral sciences, medicine and health care in light of current political perspectives makes this a pioneering work. He courageously interrogates the status quo within various disciplines, but he is no cynic. Yong offers concrete responses not only for the church but also the broader community. Yong speaks boldly from within his Pentecostal tradition, but this work is in no way limited to Pentecostal readers. Finally, Yong grapples with his own family story; he writes as Amos, a brother to Mark. This work should serve as an excellent resource for upper division undergraduate as well as graduate courses ranging from theology to the social and behavioral sciences, health care industry, education, and the humanities.

Bibliography

Brendan Byrne, The Hospitality of God: A Reading of Luke’s Gospel (Collegeville: Liturgical Press,

2000).

Gordon Fee, The Disease of the Health and Wealth Gospels (Vancouver: Regent Publishing,

1985).

Mittelstadt, The Spirit and Suffering in Luke-Acts: Implications for a Pentecostal Pneumatology

(JPT Sup, 26; London: T & T Clark, 2004).

Henri Nouwen, Adam: God’s Beloved (New York: Orbis, 1997).

Jean Vanier, From Brokenness to Community (New Jersey: Paulist Press, 1992).

Grant Wacker, Heaven Below: Early Pentecostals and American Culture (Cambridge: Harvard

University Press, 2001).

9

10