My Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

Fifteen years ago, the American Bishops jointly issued a special pastoral letter on Persons with Disabilities. Ten years ago my predecessor, Cardinal Edmund Szoka, promulgated an Archdiocesan policy on accessibility for persons with disabilities. It seems appropriate to take the occasion of these anniversaries to reaffirm our commitment to this dimension of pastoral life here in our Church of Detroit.

Again and again, each of us needs to examine our patterns of thinking, acting and speaking: Are we conscious of persons with disabilities and their specific needs and gifts? Does our parish take into account everyone's right of accessibility to the Church buildings, sacramental celebrations and parish programming? Do we recognize our parish as an independent mosaic of needs and gifts? Are we generous and gentle ministers - ready to welcome and ready to receive?

While our country and Church have become much more sensitive to persons with disabilities, the true and lasting inner conversion has yet to take place in many of our hearts. Widening doorways and adapting restrooms, building ramps and the like are only cosmetic. More importantly, a deeper attitudinal change and commitment are also needed. As Christians our zealous concern for persons with disabilities should flow from a profound theological vision of all human persons as created and redeemed in Christ. For that reason, I begin this letter with theological reflections; practical pastoral applications will follow.

The Strength and Worth Of a Human Person
The strength and worth of the human person are not granted by government decree or by the judgment of the community. Over the centuries the Scriptures and the Church have consistently proclaimed that every human life is a precious gift of a loving God. That fact alone should be enough to require respect and reverence for every human person. As Christians, we have even more compelling rationale - the example and presence of Jesus. Christ's life given for us teaches us that every human life is of such value to God that he would sacrifice his only Son. He continues to be present whenever and wherever we gather in his name.

The respect that we show all human life extends from the miracle of conception to the last breath of natural death; it also includes the full spectrum of life between its beginning and its ending. Nowhere is that teaching more critical than for persons with disabilities. At either end of life's spectrum, the person with a disability is faced with the threat of death. The unborn child with a disability is more likely to be aborted than to be born; the frail elderly person with a disability could easily be subjected to social expectations of euthanasia. Might we not be perceived as subtly giving in to such an anti -life mentality by excluding persons with disabilities from the ordinary life cycle of our parishes? We show our pro-life commitment by welcoming, both by our words and by our deeds, all members of our community including persons with disabilities.

I am reminded of the many Gospel accounts of Jesus meeting with, talking to and changing the lives of persons with disabilities - the man born blind, persons with paralysis, people with leprosy, and many more. These cures were not intended solely for the individual person with the disability; rather, they were signs and manifestations of the identity and power of Jesus, the inauguration of the new Creation Jesus was bringing forth through the community of faith. In our own day the sacraments of the Church continue to proclaim and enact the healing presence of the Word among us. They empower and renew us all, granting health of body and spirit. They also energize us to extend to others the healing we have experienced.

Accessibility
Parish churches and all parish facilities and Archdiocesan buildings are to formulate a plan to become fully accessible. State and federal legislation have created standards and expectations of accessibility. Although we are guided by those standards, our ultimate motivation should be our interior conviction. Again, it is not just a question of protecting or assuring rights that have been legislated. As a people of faith we are recognizing God-given rights and equality. Whenever the opportunity for full access for persons with disabilities is denied, the community is diminished.

Accessibility means much more than doors that will accommodate a wheel chair or ramps for I passage. A spirit of accessibility entails doing everything possible to ensure full participation of all parish members in all activities and committees.

Some parishes will find this an easier goal to achieve than others. Parishes and schools with limited means are not being asked to impoverish themselves in a short term effort to provide total accessibility. But I am asking that all parishes, schools and Catholic agencies make progress toward accessibility along three lines: attitude, accomodation, and architecture.

Attitude
A fully Christian attitude about disabilities begins with recognizing that people with disabilities are present and active in our communities. Attitude means looking at all people as co-equals - brothers and sisters who have something to give as well as being in need of receiving other complementary gifts. The full participation of persons with disabilities and their families will make our parishes and institutions all the more vital.

All too often, over the years, here and elsewhere, I have heard comments like these: "We don 't have any people with disabilities in our parish. I never see them. They probably don't want to come here anyway." Likewise, I have also heard these comments from persons with disabilities: "There is no one like me in that church. I have to be carried in. I'm too embarrassed. They don't want me."

At the beginning of this letter, I spoke about the strength and worth of the human person. I was not referring to simply physical strength but the inner strength to endure the indignity of a bumpy ride up a flight of steps to enter a building where the drinking fountains or restrooms are not accessible. I speak of the will power and discipline required of a person with a disability who must focus enormous energies just to accomplish what many of us do with ease. I think of the conviction of faith necessary in order to overcome and forgive attitudes of exclusion and rejection encountered on the way to becoming an integral part of a parish or school community.

Attitude requires moving from a simple acknowledgment of the existence of persons with disabilities to a genuine willingness to serve the total community with respectful and gracious hospitality. If your parish or school can do only small things to achieve accessibility, communicate with the persons with disabilities to let them know you cared enough to: 1) study the problems; 2) to do the things you could, and 3) to outline the difficulties beyond your abilities with a realistic time line for their accomplishment.

I ask parishes to appoint, and/or reaffirm support for, a Parish Representative for Disability Concerns. Such a Representative will assist with attitude formation in each parish and will serve as a conduit for information to and from the Archdiocesan offices concerned with persons with disabilities.

Attitude does not deal with capital outlay or brick and mortar; it flows from our minds and hearts. Such attitudinal commitment is definitely within the capability of every person, parish, and institution of this Archdiocese.

Accomodation
Accomodation refers to the many, inexpensive things that can be done to make a building more accessible. Such openness and a spirit of accommodation flow from an attitude of Christian concern for the rights of others and from the recognition that all members of our community are needed to be truly "Catholic."

Some examples of accomodation include:

• painting blue lines in the parking lot to delineate handclapped parking;
• a sign providing accessibility information for persons with disabilities;
• moving a reading stand to take advantage of a brighter light;
• large print missalettes;
• an adequate sound system or one adaptable to hearing assistance;
• flooring and floor surfaces acceptable to a person using wheels or an unsteady foot.

All of these things, while simple in themselves, exhibit a sensitivity to all persons in the parish community. By adapting an "auto to altar" approach to accessibility, parishes are extending to all members of the parish community an equal opportunity to take part in parish liturgical roles.

Architecture
Architecture refers to major parish construction or remodeling which must take into consideration the special circumstances of persons with disabilities. The federal and state legislation titled Americans With Disabilities Act and the Michigan Handicapper Civil Rights Act provide the standards which the Archdiocese of Detroit follows in all new construction and major remodeling.

There may be accessibility challenges in some of our older buildings that will be, for the time being, beyond the resources of parish, vicariate or Archdiocese; but there is no excuse for inaccessibility within a new or newly remodeled building.

Practical Considerations
To assist parishes with the many challenges of attitude, accomodation, and architecture, I have directed the Office of Catholic Social Action in the Department of Parish Life and Services, to send to all Archdiocesan parishes and institutions a copy of the Archdiocesan Accessibility Plan. This plan outlines suggestions for both long term and short term changes in our buildings and, more importantly, it also addresses the necessary conversion of heart.

The work of making our buildings accessible will continue for years to come. At the very minimum, by 1995, I ask that there be at least one I totally accessible parish in every vicariate. In my deliberations with the Archdiocesan Pastoral Council, I am asking that Vicariate Councils assess and prepare an accessibility plan for the buildings within each vicariate. Vicariates that already have one accessible parish or more should work toward increasing their list of accessible parishes on a realistic timetable until we have achieved total accessibility. This vicariate effort will coincide with the accessibility projects already in progress in the vicariates. The recent education Vision Statement One in Faith and Knowledge directed that "parishes and Catholic Schools will ensure that persons with disabilities will have equal access to all forms of Catholic Education."

Inter-parish and vicariate-wide cooperation will assure total accessibility within a realistic geographic reach of all. Such a spirit of cooperative commitment is already evident in the many independent volunteer groups within the Archdiocese of Detroit who labor to create housing or persons with developmental disabilities.

What we do now will be of continuing importance for years to come as our communities age and our communities welcome persons with disabilities.

There are many kinds of disabilities, psychotically and physical, temporary and permanent. Each of us has a disability of one sort or another. Once we can recognize the reality of our limitations and our need for support of the community, we will also grow in our eagerness to welcome all others into full membership and partnership in the life of the community.

Life Connections
As we move toward total accessibility through attitude, accommodation and architecture we should call to mind the 1978 challenge of the American Bishops' from their Pastoral Letter on Persons with Disabilities:

"People with disabilities are not looking for pity. They seek to serve the community and to enjoy their full baptismal rights as members of the Church. Our interaction with them can and should be an affirmation of our faith. There can be no separate Church for people with disabilities."

I have spoken on many occasions of the need to replace our society's utilitarian view of life with our Christian understanding of the human person as inherently deserving of respect. Abortion and euthanasia are the products of a utilitarian mentality.

Throughout history and throughout the world, many persons with disabilities have lived and still live in fear of persecution, rejection or marginalization. The fallacy persists that persons with disabilities are not useful. By our indifference and rejection we feed the fallacy and the fear. The simple truth is that persons with disabilities form an inexhaustible reservoir of gifts and talents which they yearn to place at the disposal of our society and our faith communities.

The "pro-life" teaching of our Church can be summarized by the following slogan:

"Who we are is immeasurably more important than anything we can do!

Each one of us has different gifts and abilities. All gifts are precious as they come from God. In every human person we see "the clearest reflection of God among us..." (USCC Respect Life, 1992). Our ministry is somehow insufficient whenever we fail to call upon all the many gifts freely offered to our communities by persons with disabilities: Our wholeness as a community is diminished when any members of the community are excluded.

In this regard I am reminded of the words of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.:

"We are caught in an inescapable network or mutuality, tied in a single garment of density. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. We cannot long survive spiritually separated in a world that is geographically together."

When our Holy Father, Pope John Paul II, visited our nation for World Youth Day, in August, he boldly and forcefully proclaimed the implications of our Christian faith. Belief in Jesus as the Son of God brings with it the consolation and the challenge that every human person is worthy of respect and full dignity.

I conclude by quoting his message spoken at the Denver Airport, words he had earlier delivered at our own Metro Airport in 1987:

"America, you are beautiful and blessed in so many ways… But your best beauty and your richest blessing is found in the human person: in each man, woman and child…. The ultimate test of your greatness is the way you treat every human being...If you want equal justice for all, and true freedom and lasting peace, then, America, defend life! All the great causes that are yours today will have meaning only to the extent that you guarantee the right to life and protect the human person."

In this spirit, may we recognize and welcome the presence of Christ in every one of our brothers and sisters. May we remember that we are one body in Christ always ready to welcome and ready to receive.