Disability theology and eschatology : hope, justice, and flourishing / edited by Preston McDaniel Hill, Aaron Brian Davis.

Format:

Book

Contributor:

Cawdron, Harvey, contributor.

Coblentz, Jessica, contributor.

Davis, Aaron Brian, contributor.

Davis, Aaron Brian, editor.

Estes, Derek, contributor.

Hill, Preston McDaniel, editor.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Disabilities--Religious aspects--Christianity.

Disabilities.

Eschatology.

Future life--Christianity.

Future life.

Human body--Religious aspects--Christianity.

Human body.

Physical Description:

1 online resource

Edition:

1st ed.

Distribution:

New York : Bloomsbury Publishing (US), 2025.

Place of Publication:

Lexington Books, 2025.

System Details:

text file rdaft

Summary:

This book offers an array of novel essays, each advancing discourse surrounding the nature of disability and Christian vision of life in the world to come. The contributors advance conversations on disability through the lenses of theology, philosophy, psychology/psychiatry, and more.

Christian theology looks forward to a consummation of all things in which hope, justice, and flourishing will finally prevail. All creation will be perfectly united to God as its Creator, and all shall be well. But what does this mean for disabled people? The typical Christian answer through history has been that disability will not exist in the world to come. The advent of disability theology has given us reasons to doubt this answer. In response, Disability Theology and Eschatology: Hope, Justice, and Flourishing gathers together essays from established and emerging scholars alike to provide an extensive look at what it might mean to imagine disability as a part of humanity's ultimate ends. The volume advances conversations in disability theology through rigorously creative work, including on the much neglected topic of psychiatric disability. Contributors ask and answer questions like “how can one's well-being be high if they are disabled?,” “do Thomists have to be ableists?,” “how do our beauty standards limit our eschatological thinking?,” “what does dissociative identity disorder mean for the afterlife?,” and more.

Contents:

Cover

Half Title

Title Page

Copyright Page

Dedication

Contents

Acknowledgments

Introduction: Disability Theology and Eschatology

What We Have Seen Before

What We Aim to Do

What We Will See Here

Notes

Bibliography

Part I: Disability in the Resurrection

Chapter 1: A Theory of Well-Being for Disability Theology

Four Consensus Claims

Prelude to the Claims

Disability is Not a Result of the Fall

Disability is Socially Constructed

Disability Can Be Identity-Making for Human Persons

Disability Might Persist in the Resurrection of the Body

Summary

Some Preliminaries on Human Well-Being

Theories in General

Hedonistic, Desire-Satisfaction, and Objective List Theories

Hybrid Theories

Desire-Perfectionism

Eschatological Desire-Perfectionism

Conclusion

Chapter 2: For the Beauty of Glory: Aquinas, Disability, and Resurrection

Two Views about Disability

Aquinas and Teleological Failure

A Bad-Difference Reading of Aquinas

Aquinas on the Wounds of Christ

A Thomistic Account of Disability in the Resurrection

Chapter 3: Disability, Life After Death, and the True Self

The True Self and Frankfurt's Account of the Nature of a Person

Narrative and the True Self

Suffering and the Notion of the True Self

The Convergence of Personal Thriving and Deepest Heart's Desires

Chapter 4: Beautiful Bodies: Disgust, Diverse Embodiment, and Redeemed Perception in the Eschaton

The Body as a Project Where the End Goal Is Beauty

Eschatological Expectations for Human Embodiment

The Retention of Diverse Embodiment in the Resurrection Body

The Persisting Wounds of the Post-Resurrection Christ.

Disassembling Disgust and Disability

Beholding Beauty and Perceiving Perfection

Conclusion: Adoring the Wounded Body, Welcoming the Diverse Body

Part II: Psychiatric Disabilities

Chapter 5: Yo-Yo Hope, "Symptom Talk," and the Courage Not to Be Well: A Practical Theology of Chronic Illness, Long COVID, and Hope

Overview

The Weight of Hope

Being Forced to Reject Christian Hope

Hanging onto Christian Hope and Incurring Mental Distress

Internalizing Suffering and Shame

Revised Discourses of Hope

Hope That "No Matter What Happens, I Will Be Okay."

Hope in the Mystery of God

Hope in Small Improvements and in Redefining Well-Being

Hope in Immanuel

Hope in Community and Structural Change

Hope in the Bigger Story and in the Day-to-Day

Discussion

Chapter 6: The Afterlives of Saint Dymphna: Situating Psychiatric Disabilities within the Communion of Saints

Psychiatric Disability and the Communion of Saints

Kindred Disabled

Intercessory Healers

Inspired Collaborators

Chapter 7: "Ask, Wish, and Believe Through Another": Dissociative Identity Disorder and a Renewed Doctrine of Fides Aliena

The Experience of Faith in Extreme DID Cases

Theo-Clinical Proposals: Surveying the Field

Salvation and the Integration of Personalities

Salvation as Diversified to the Alters

The Saving Faith of Another-The Ancient Grace of Fides Aliena

Beyond Disability: Implications for Deconstruction and Parts Psychology

Chapter 8: Dissociative Identity Disorder in the Eschaton: Community, Integration, and Life After Death

Dissociative Identity Disorder: An Overview

Alters in the Afterlife

The Mere-Difference View of Disability

Diversity in the Afterlife.

The Multiple Persons Worry

Objections

Integration Around the Good

Concerns About Well-being

Eventual Integration in the Eschaton

Index

About the Editors and Contributors.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

979-88-8189-544-0

1-66695-436-5

OCLC:

1507695833