About seven years ago my ophthalmologist told me that I could no longer hold a driver's license. This was bad news but it gets worse. Over the next few months my vision deteriorated to the point where I could not read ordinary print even with the aid of glasses. At this point I was declared legally blind. This means that while I could still see well enough to get around I could
not recognize faces or read signs unless the print was very large. Fortunately the deterioration stopped at this point and has remained at this level for the past six years.

Being legally blind has been a very interesting experience in many ways. For instance I found that people are generally very kind. Total strangers are happy to help me get on the correct bus or read price tags in stores. I also found that my understanding of the limitations that a disability causes has improved. I feel
that now I can empathize much more accurately with other disabilities. Other insights continue to occur.

Having a physical disability is not fun, but neither is it the end of the world. Most people who have a disability reach some kind of acceptance. We get past the point where we focus on all the things we can no longer do, and turn our attention to discovering what we can do. We understand that acceptance does
not mean giving up. Rather it is a realization that this is my reality and that the best choice is to learn to live with it. Learning to live with a disability is not easy but I know a lot of people who have done it and, in the process, found peace.

But how can this acceptance be accomplished? For most of us some help is needed. Family and friends can be very helpful in this regard. But family and friends are not always available when needed. Sometimes when we are feeling depressed or frustrated we may be entirely alone and we are forced to rely on our own inner resources.

For a person of faith, of course, we know that we do have more than just our inner resources. We have God to turn to for help. We can pray for peace of mind, for acceptance. We certainly find support in the gospels where we see Jesus consistently reaching out to the excluded members of society.

Jesus is the best advocate that the disabled community ever had or ever will have. The gospels are full of stories that deal with Jesus helping the lame, the maimed, the blind and the diseased. In the story of the good Samaritan, Jesus answers the question, "Who is our neighbor?"  It is clear in the story that Jesus is sending all of us a message and this message is directed to both the disabled community and to those in a position to help and support that community.

I facilitate a support group for visually impaired people, and I once asked them to define "hope." They quickly agreed that the opposite of hope was despair. They had more difficulty defining "hope", but finally agreed that it had to do with our having confidence that in the final result everything would turn out well. Some went further to say that hope was confidence that God
was present in their lives and a constant support in their struggles.

Those of us who are physically disabled can be confident that Jesus will give us peace of mind. Jesus can help us to deal with the fear, frustration and anger that can afflict us. Jesus can give us a perspective that is both comforting and reassuring. Jesus can give us hope.

As for those in a position to help the disabled, Jesus demonstrated how to avoid being patronizing. Jesus showed us how to see the whole person and not just the disability.

Even if having a physical disability is not fun it can be seen as an opportunity to discover one's own real strength. It can also help us to come closer to God's very real love for us.

At that time I still wanted to use my eyes.  I followed their
usual path. I looked in the direction where I was in the habit of
seeing before the accident... Finally, I realized that I was
looking in the wrong way, I was looking too far off, and too much
on the surface of things.. I began to look more closely, not at
things but at a world closer to myself, looking from an inner
place to one further within, instead of clinging to the movement
of sight toward the world outside. Immediately, the substance of
the universe drew together, redefined and peopled itself anew. I
was aware of a radiance emanating from a place I knew nothing
about, a place which might as well have been outside me as
within.. I felt indescribable relief, and happiness so great it
almost made me laugh... Sighted people always talk about the
night of blindness, and that seems to the quite natural. But
there is no such night, for at every waking hour and even in my
dreams I lived in a stream of light. Without my eyes, light was
much more stable than it had been with them. As I remember it,
there were no longer the same differences between things lighted
brightly, less brightly, or not at all. I saw the whole world in
light, existing through it and because of it.

Jacques Lusseyran, “And there Was Light,” trans. Elizabeth R. Cameron, Little Brown 1963.