Amplifying Our Witness
Giving Voice to Adolescents with Developmental Disabilities
Published on 11. June 2012
92 pages
978-1-4674-3605-2 (ISBN)
Description
Nearly twenty percent of adolescents have developmental disabilities, yet far too often they are marginalized within churches. Amplifying Our Witness challenges congregations to adopt a new, practice-centered approach to congregational ministry -- one that includes and amplifies the witness of adolescents with developmental disabilities. Replete with stories taken from Benjamin Conner's own extensive experience with befriending and discipling adolescents with developmental disabilities, Amplifying Our Witness Shows how churches exclude the mentally disabled in various structural and even theological waysStresses the intrinsic value of kids with developmental disabilitiesReconceptualizes evangelism to adolescents with developmental disabilities, emphasizing hospitality and friendship.
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Benjamin T. Conner
Amplifying Our Witness
Giving Voice to Adolescents with Developmental Disabilities
Book
06/2012
William B Eerdmans Publishing Co
€21.40
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Person
Benjamin T. Conner is associate professor of Christian discipleship at Western Theological Seminary, Holland, Michigan.
Content
- Intro
- Title Page
- Copyright
- Contents
- Preface and Acknowledgments
- 1. Introduction: "Life Is Liturgy"
- Disconnected
- Key Concepts of the Book
- Amplifying Our Witness
- Practice-Centered Ministry
- Adolescence
- My Biased Perspective (as Opposed to Your Biased Perspective)
- Practical Theology
- Missional Theology
- Structure of the Book
- 2. Awakened to the Issues: Visio Dei
- Awakened to the Issues
- Emmanuel's Gift
- Dissed
- Labels
- "Aching Emptiness"
- Spiritual Nomads
- The Need for a New Approach to Ministry
- 3. Affirming Presence: Imago Dei
- "I Did It!"
- "Off-Duty Image of God"
- Friendship
- "Deodorant and Discipleship"
- Friendship in Historical Perspective
- Unlikely Alliances
- Relationships as Sacramental, Not Instrumental
- Fireworks
- Place-Sharing
- Elected to Friendship
- "My Place"
- Connected
- Peers
- Rejection: Coping with a Lack of Markers
- The Inconvenience of Friendship
- 4. Amplifying Our Witness: Missio Dei
- From Jesters to Gesturers
- Missio Dei
- Witness
- Professor Nathan
- Iconic Witness
- Evocative Witness
- The Witness of All Creation
- Friendship as a Missional Christian Practice
- 5. Advocating an Approach: Opus Dei
- Opus Dei
- Step One: You Have to Be a Professional
- Step Two: Develop Peer Buddies
- Step Three: Make Hospitality the Context of All of Your Programs
- Step Four: Partake in Gestured Practices
- Step Five: Develop a Proclamatory Program
- Feeling Faith
- Smelling Sanctification
- Heavenly Host(ing)
- Baptism and the Lord's Supper
- Step Six: Challenge Church Structures
- Epilogue: Taste and See That the Lord Is Good: Toward a Theology of Evangelism Informed by a Life Sharedwith Adolescents with Developmental Disabilities
- "Thank You for Bringing Me into Your Life"
- A Parable
- Bibliography
- Index
