The Baptized Body: Exploring Disability and Theological Anthropology

“… theological resources are needed to help the church reflect faithfully on discipleship, especially as it intersects with core Christian practices. ”

Team Members/Contributors

Sarah J Barton Duke Divinity School Contact Me

About this dissertation fellowship

My dissertation investigates how baptismal practices among Christian faith communities support or conflict with notions of personhood robustly inclusive of persons with profound intellectual disabilities. Despite best ecclesial intentions to foster increasing inclusion for persons with disabilities, practices across a wide range of Christian traditions still espouse assumptions that rely on individualistic and autonomous constructions of the human being. My dissertation draws upon the lived experiences of persons with intellectual disabilities as they participate in faith communities, as well as the narratives of their caregivers, clergy members, and fellow community members. Through an engagement with this qualitative research, literature in critical disability studies, Pauline theology, and disability theology and ethics literature, I argue that Christian theologies and practices of baptism provide a key means of dismantling tacit assumptions about the racialized and medicalized enclosure of the body. On the contrary, a baptismal hermeneutic allows for the centering of a radically interdependent notion of personhood. As such, practices and theologies of baptism affirm a theological anthropology grounded in communal, participatory, and Christological notions of personhood. Focused ecclesial attention to cultivating an embrace of these practices and theologies across the ecumenical spectrum provides a key means to fostering the belonging of persons with profound intellectual disabilities in the life of the church and affirming the baptismal vocation of all those baptized, including persons with profound and multiple disabilities.