Abstract
In his foreword to this volume, the renowned disability theologian John Swinton refers to Becoming the Baptized Body as “fascinating and important” (p. xii), noting the contributions it makes to developing a theological method that produces doctrinal theology (in this case, especially a theology of baptism) and a set of practices that both flow from and subsequently shape theological ideas, doing so alongside and in conversation with people who live with intellectual disabilities. Swinton is absolutely right in his assessment.
In Becoming the Baptized Body, Sarah Jean Barton’s wager is that “understanding experiences of disability as generative sites for reimagination supports the work of theologizing in community.” She contends that deeply listening to the baptismal ideas and experiences of those with intellectual disabilities will not only guide theological reflection on practices and theologies of baptism, but [will] spur on church communities to the holy and creative task of reimagining both present and future realities that embrace diverse baptismal vocations among disabled and nondisabled people who seek to follow Jesus together. (p. 7)
As Assistant Professor of Occupational Therapy and Theological Ethics at Duke University, with a dual appointment to both the Duke Divinity School and the Duke University School of Medicine, Barton is simultaneously a Christian theologian and a clinician with expertise in the field of disability. Becoming the Baptized Body is therefore a highly unusual book: it is a work of practical theology written by a trained systematic theologian who also works as a clinician and disability advocate and who is ecclesially grounded in her Episcopalian community and practice, shaped by the theological ethos and rites of The Book of Common Prayer (BCP). The combination of these elements of Barton’s life and work, which indelibly marks the research, findings, and recommendations presented in the book, makes Becoming the Baptized Body a welcome addition to a growing literature seeking to close the gap between systematic and practical theology, on one hand, and to center the lives and experiences of Christians with disabilities in the theological and ecclesial enterprise, on the other hand.
Barton writes in a straightforward, jargon-free, accessible manner that does not require previous mastery of the various fields through which she moves. She begins with a helpful survey of the current lay of the land in disability theology, including its key figures, conversations, and trajectories. Then, in her most technical (but still highly readable) portion of the book, Barton provides a procedural account of the way in which her study–consisting primarily of interviewing Christians who are intellectually disabled or care for those who are about their theologies and experiences of baptism–was conducted and the data were analyzed. She then moves to reviewing how baptism is presented in the gospels and in the Pauline literature before exploring over her final three chapters how baptism itself and baptismal practices (such as catechesis, testimony, and reaffirmation) are liturgically enacted and experienced. These scriptural and liturgical investigations are carried out with constant reference to the insights and experiences reflected in the interviews she conducted.
Anyone who is interested in the ecclesial context for doing the work of theology will be interested in what Barton’s research is uncovering. Her interview subjects often reflect an understanding of baptism quite in keeping with the theological claim that baptism is the enactment of new life in Christ and incorporation into the ecclesial body, though Barton does not shy away from providing a perspective on baptizing those for whom such an understanding is seemingly impossible. They also demonstrate the extent to which church practices fall short. When those with intellectual disabilities are denied access to the rite, when a theology of what baptism is and means is carried out with no reference to the lived lives of those with intellectual disabilities, something critical has gone awry. Moreover, Barton points out that the active participation of those with intellectual disabilities in churches can sometimes give the lie to what is claimed in our baptismal rites. For example, Barton suggests that when the congregation of an Episcopal church following the rite of baptism in the BCP pledge to uphold the spiritual development of the newly baptized, there is often a gap between this promise and the resulting action in the case of those with intellectual disabilities. She rightly concludes that the language of promise with regard to support through transformation lays bare the theological thrust of practicing baptism: with God’s help, churches must find ways to directly and wholeheartedly support the baptismal vocations and identities of people with intellectual disabilities. (pp. 126–127)
To be sure, doing theology in the way Barton proposes is messy and complicated. It raises all sorts of thorny issues, including some she herself does not raise directly (such as the fraught question of the status of experience in the theological endeavor). But these are exactly the right issues to be confronting, and Barton’s approach presents us with a very provocative and welcome way of beginning to do so.
