S9 E2 — What if disability isn’t something to fix, but a way to see God and one another more clearly? Theologian John Swinton joins Amy Julia Becker to explore how our ideas of perfection, healing, and humanity can distort—or deepen—our understanding of the good life. Together, they imagine a church and a world that welcomes every body as good, beloved, and whole. They explore:
- How culture shapes (and distorts) our perceptions of disability and beauty
- What it means for a world to be both wounded and beloved
- Why the difference between goodness and perfection matters
- How interdependence includes both beauty and a cost
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00:00 Introduction
02:54 Significance of Disability in Faith
05:50 Cultural Perceptions of Disability
08:50 The Image of God and Human Relationships
11:45 Understanding Goodness vs. Perfection
18:18 Goodness and Suffering
23:55 The Power of Naming and Identity
27:38 Relationality and the Cost of Interdependence
35:38 Resisting Culture's Distortions of the Image of God
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MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:
- Christianity Today essay: “It Was Good, Not Perfect.”
- Genesis 1-3
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ABOUT OUR GUEST:
John Swinton is Professor in Practical Theology and Pastoral Care and Chair in Divinity and Religious Studies at the University of Aberdeen. For more than a decade John worked as a registered mental health nurse. He also worked for a number of years as a hospital and community mental health Chaplain alongside of people with severe mental health challenges who were moving from the hospital into the community. In 2004, he founded the University of Aberdeen’s Centre for Spirituality, Health and Disability. He has published widely within the area of mental health, dementia, disability theology, spirituality and healthcare, end of life care, qualitative research and pastoral care. John is the author of a number of monographs including Finding Jesus in the Storm: The spiritual lives of people with mental health challenges. (Eerdmans 2020) which won the Aldersgate prize for outstanding interdisciplinary work within theology. His book Dementia: Living in the memories of God won the Archbishop of Canterbury’s Ramsey Prize for excellence in theological writing.
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