In the News

An excellent article by Sharisa Lewis in Meridian Magazine titled Helping Autism Families Survive Church. She discusses the struggles that her own family had in Church and how one family made a difference. From the article:

Teaching the Gospel to Children With Disabilities is a short article from the LDS Newsroom that discusses adapting classes for children with disabilities.

In an article in Meridian Magazine, Sharisa Lewis writes abouts experiences at Church with her 4-year old son who has autism.

Why is church so hard for autistic children? The answers can vary as widely as the children. Initially, I thought our child was just being difficult, but autism specialists have advised me that church is hard for most autistic kids.

Taking Autism to Church

David Dollahite is a professor in the School of Family Life at BYU's School of Family Life. He has written extensively on the involvement of fathers with their children with disabilities, in addition to providing many other resources for fathers. A few months ago he was interviewed by Krista Tippett of the excellent public radio program Speaking of Faith on the spirituality of parenting and he specifically addressed the spirituality of children with disabilities.

Here are a few of stories from the news that have you may not have seen yet:

Teens Host Carnival for Special Needs Kids

An article about the Cache Valley Special Needs Mutual program in Logan, Utah:

...because many of the developmentally disabled adults’ parents are elderly and unable to take them outside of the house often, for some, each week’s activity is the only social interaction they have.

Also:

Caretakers for the participants also benefit from the activities, Gunnell said. She said with the two-hour length of the program and the half hour or so to and from the activity, caretakers have three hours to spend on their own.

via LDS Today

This article from the Deseret News titled Death ends teen's lifetime of struggles is a profound reminder for me of why every minute given to this site is time well spent.

J.J. Serassio was a 16-year old high school student who had autism. J.J. committed suicide. J.J. parked his new red Camaro in the garage, left the engine running and died of carbon monoxide poisoning. He left a note on the passenger seat where "he described himself as an outcast at school and at church".

First, from the Deseret News, a story titled Paralysis — Not Defeat about Gael Yonnet, a medical student at the University of Utah who was recently recently paralyzed from the waist down from injuries sustained in a snowboarding accident. Gael is from Bordeaux, France and is living in Salt Lake with the parents of the missionary who taught him about the Church. From Fred Langeland, his host:

He's a very capable young man with a lot of potential; this has not diminished that.

A great article today from the Salt Lake Tribune titled Peer tutors learn with their hearts about seminary classes at East High School in Salt City that include both special education students as well as their peers without disabilities. From the article:

The friends are special needs students at East who join students for seminary, the LDS Church's program that allows teens to use one school period to receive spiritual instruction. The students in two classes at East act as peer tutors for others with a variety of special needs and conditions, including Down Syndrome, cerebral palsy, autism and learning disabilities.

From the Maimi Herald, a story about Timothy Hughes, who is serving a sign language mission in Florida. The articles discusses the branch where he serves, how they go about finding investigators, his background growing up in South Africa and ends with these quotes from Hughes:

That's part of the problem; sometimes, when there's a lack of communication, the deaf person loses interest or can't understand you.

And also: