Every Child Belongs
Every Child Belongs explores how we can create spaces where every child feels heard and valued, whether neurodivergent, differently abled, or they've experienced trauma. We'll hear from educators, parents, professionals, and more. Kim Botto is an adoptive mom, grandma, an advocate for kids and teens with disabilities, as well as a long-time leader of kids and student ministries.
Episodes
What if the greatest challenge facing people with disabilities isn't disability at all?
What if it's isolation?
Matt Mooney, co-founder of Ninety-Nine Balloons, believes the Church has a unique opportunity to change that story. After losing their first son, Elliott, who lived just ninety-nine days with Trisomy 18, Matt and his wife, Ginny, found themselves drawn into a community that would forever change the way t...
When Nadia Ibrahim Mossburg was growing up with cerebral palsy, she rarely saw someone like herself serving in the Church.
That absence shaped her life, but it also became the foundation for her calling.
As a disability rights advocate, federal policy expert, and author of Divinely Disabled, Nadia has spent decades fighting for accessibility while reminding the Church that policy alone cannot create belonging. Rea...
Jason Le Shana believes that's the wrong first question.
As a pastor, researcher at Baylor University, parent of a neurodivergent son, and someone living with a disability himself, Jason brings a unique perspective to what t...
When Amy Julia Becker's daughter Penny was born with Down syndrome, everything she imagined about the future suddenly changed. Fear, grief, uncertainty, and love all arrived at once.
In this conversation, Amy Julia shares how that unexpected diagnosis reshaped not only her understanding of disability, but also her understanding of God, belonging, friendship, and what it truly means to live a meaningful life.
Toget...
What if one of the largest unreached people groups in your community is hiding in plain sight?
In this episode of Every Child Belongs, Kim Botto sits down with disability advocate, ministry leader, and educator Abby Howard. After a rare spinal cord stroke at age 19 left her paralyzed from the chest down, Abby's life changed overnight. What began as a devastating medical crisis eventually became a calling to help churches m...
What does belonging actually look like for families raising neurodivergent children, children with trauma histories, and kids with significant disabilities?
In this episode of Every Child Belongs, Kim Botto sits down with foster and adoptive mom, educator, and trauma-informed parenting advocate Kayla North for a deeply honest conversation about parenting, empathy, church belonging, and helping every child discover their pl...
What if the problem isn't that churches don't care… but that they don't know where to start? In this episode of Every Child Belongs, Kim Botto sits down with ministry leader Ryan Faulk to talk about what it really means to help neurodivergent and disabled kids belong in church communities. Ryan serves as Director of Children and Disability Ministry at Cornerstone Church in California and has spent years helping churches move...
What if the "misbehavior" you're seeing… isn't misbehavior at all?
Lori Crosby, licensed marriage and family therapist and co-founder of the Reach Hurting Kids Institute, joins Kim to unpack how trauma impacts children and how we can better support them at home and in church.
Drawing from her own story of loss and healing, Lori shares why behavior is always communication, and how small shifts in how we resp...
What happens when you love your child… but being around them feels overwhelming?
In this deeply honest conversation, Kim Botto sits down with adoptive mom, author, and TBRI practitioner Lisa Qualls to talk about something many parents feel—but few say out loud: blocked care.
Lisa shares her personal story of adoption, trauma, and parenting through extremely hard seasons. From feeling confident as...
What does it really take for someone to feel like they belong?
In this episode of Every Child Belongs, Kim talks with psychiatrist, author, and speaker Dr. Curt Thompson about belonging, shame, suffering, rupture and repair, and the kind of community that helps people heal.
Drawing from his work, his books, and his experience serving at Hope Heals Camp, Curt shares why belonging is never just a vague idea. It is s...
In this episode of Every Child Belongs, Kim sits down with Meredith Shuman, founder of James Trail, trauma-informed trainer, therapist, adoptive mom, and passionate advocate for families impacted by trauma.
Meredith brings nearly three decades of experience working with children, families, churches, and organizations across the U.S. and around the world. Together, Kim and Meredith explore why community and felt safety are ess...
Henry explains what makes a session successful: preparation with parents before the appointment, reading nonve...
What changes a church more than a new program? Sometimes it's a friendship.
Kim sits down with Ryan Wolfe, President of Ability Ministry, for a conversation that's both practical and deeply personal. Ryan shares the stories of Clyde and Coral, two friends who shaped his calling and helped him see the difference between doing ministry for people with disabilities and doing ministry with them (and ultimately&n...
In this episode of Every Child Belongs, Kim talks with Josh Zello, founder of JesusLovesPreschoolers.com, about building gospel-centered, developmentally rich preschool ministries where kids feel safe, known, and loved.
Josh shares what changed when he moved from Texas to Baltimore and stepped into ministry in an urban context where trust is not assumed. He explains why many outreach events fail when they require parents t...
In this episode, Kim talks with Cortney Jenkins, founder of Awe and Wonder, about practical, realistic ways churches can create spaces where kids with disabilities truly belong. Cortney shares how her years as a middle school special education teacher shaped her passion to bridge the gap between classroom strategies and church ministry, and why her adapted Bible resources help more than one group of learners.
Cortney unpac...
In this episode of Every Child Belongs, Kim talks with Stephanie Smith, CEO and founder of Kingdom Inclusion, a ministry creating inclusive environments for teens and adults with disabilities and helping churches bridge the gap between the church community and the disability community.
Stephanie shares the story behind her passion, shaped by her sister Shelly, who has cerebral palsy and uses a communication devic...
Kim talks with Brian Mavis, co-founder of America's Kids Belong, about foster care and why families are the key to changing long-term outcomes for kids from hard places. Brian shares his family's journey into foster care, how America's Kids Belong grew from storytelling and advocacy to recruiting and retaining foster families, and what communities can do to better support the families who say ye...
Dr. Erik Carter joins Every Child Belongs to talk about what belonging really means for families impacted by disability and why churches must move beyond accessibility to genuine relationships. Erik is a professor at Baylor University and Executive Director of the Baylor Center for Disability and Flourishing. He shares how friendships with young adults with ...
It's the one-year anniversary of Every Child Belongs and this episode flips the script. With Dave kicking things off, Kim Botto reflects on what the past year has meant, what surprised her most, and what she's learned from conversations with educators, therapists, parents, and advocates.
You'll hear the biggest themes that kept showing up across the season: why proximity matters, why behavior is often misunderstood, why li...
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