Each of us, including individuals with neuromuscular disease or other disabling conditions, has spiritual needs. Too often, there have been barriers to access to participation in religious activity. That All May Worship: An Interfaith Welcome to People with Disabilities addresses the solutions to these problems of accessibility for individuals from all spiritual backgrounds and with a wide variety of disabling conditions.

That All May Worship was first published in hard form 20 years ago by the National Organization on Disability. The guide has been recently updated and has been made available online at no cost by The American Association of People with Disabilities. It may be read online, or downloaded as a .pdf file (see Resources for web address).

This guide addresses a variety of physical and other types of accessibility issued related to worship. While many buildings, including places of worship, have addressed many of physical barriers to worship, other barriers, such as attitudes, planning, and communication are also discussed in this guide.

That All May Worship includes discussion of accessibility for a wide variety of disabling conditions. Those that may affect individuals with neuromuscular disease include mobility issues, sensory issues, chronic illness, and developmental disability.

This guide also meets the goal of being an interfaith resource. It includes information regarding how to address issues of accessibility and inclusion in congregations of varying faiths, and will be helpful to any faith-based organization considering these issues.

This comprehensive guide addresses other important issues as well. The role of leadership and clergy is addressed. The needs of children with disability are considered. Appropriate person-centered language is discussed. That All May Worship includes a section highlighting the needs of those providing caretaking for an individual with disability. It also includes a brief overview of the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Too often, individuals with disability have been excluded from religious participation. In other cases, participation has been limited or marginalized. Individuals and religious organization will find That All May Worship to be beneficial to their efforts towards eliminating barriers to access and making places of worship truly inclusive.

Resources:

AAPD.com, (n.d.), That All May Worship: An Interfaith Welcome to People with Disabilities. Available for online reading or as a downloadable .pdf file at https://www.aapd.com/what-we-do/interfaith/that-all-may-worship/that-all-may-worship-cover.html .

Thornburgh, G., (2014). Power Grid Blog: That All May Worship: An Interfaith Welcome to People with Disabilities. Published on the AAPD.com Power Grid Blog at https://www.aapd.com/resources/power-grid-blog/that-all-may-worship.html .

FTC Disclosure:

The material reviewed in the above article was accessed for free, and is available at no charge at the AAPD web address given above.