Making The Salvation Army Accessible to All

Across Canada, about 27 percent of people aged 15 and older live with a disability. In a country of 41 million, that translates to about 11 million people—including many people in our Salvation Army context. So, how is our territory working to improve accessibility, to ensure everyone belongs? 

On this episode, we’re joined by Colonel Margaret McLeod, chief secretary, and Major Christine Johnston, territorial disabilities consultant, who share their perspectives on how the territory is progressing in this area, and why accessibility is not an add-on, but is an essential part of the gospel and our mission. 

Resources and Further Reading:

Everybody Belongs, Serving Together – Inclusive church ministry with people with disabilities - a collaborative guide by Disability Concerns, Christian Horizons and Elim. Available is booklet form and on line at Introduction | Everybody Belongs, Serving Together | Faithward.org

From Longing to Belonging – A Practical (Steven Shakespeare, 2006) Guide to Including People with Disabilities and Mental Health Conditions in Your Faith Community – book authored by Shelly Christensen, MA FAAIDD 

Our Doors Are Open – Guide for Accessible Congregations  - an EnAbling Change Project with the Government of Ontario Our Doors Are Open – Nos portes sont ouvertes – Welcoming People with Disabilities in Places of Worship

Including People with Disabilities in Faith Communities – A Guide for Service Providers, Families and Congregations- book authored by Erik W. Carter

The 5 Stages: Changing Attitudes About Disability by Daniel Kyle Vander Plaats  Stages of Attitudes - Wheaton College, IL

Karis Disability Services Equipping Churches

Disability and Accessibility - The Salvation Army Ethics Centre

Accessibility Statement and Plan - The Salvation Army Canada and Bermuda Territory

Disability, Accessibility and Belonging - Community Mission, Canada and Bermuda Territory

Transcript

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Kristin Ostensen  

This is the Salvationist podcast. I’m Kristin Ostensen. Across Canada, about 27 percent of people aged 15 and older live with a disability. In a country of 41 million, that translates to about 11 million people—including many people in our Salvation Army context. So, how is our territory working to improve accessibility, to ensure everyone is included and celebrated? On this episode, we’re joined by Colonel Margaret McLeod and Major Christine Johnston, who share their perspectives on how the territory is progressing in this area, and why accessibility is not an add-on, but is an essential part of our mission.

Margaret McLeod  

Hi, I'm Colonel Margaret McLeod. I'm the chief secretary for the Canada and Bermuda Territory, and it's great to be with you here this afternoon.

Christine Johnston

Hi, I'm Major Christine Johnston. I'm the territorial disabilities consultant, and I have another role as a chaplain at Broadview Village here in Toronto. 

Kristin Ostensen  

So, to start us off, can we talk about what accessibility means? I think for a lot of us, perhaps our minds first go to physical structures, such as ramps, but what does accessibility encompass? Major Christine, do you want to go first?

Christine Johnston  

Sure. Yeah, and you're right. Often we think about physical structure, the building itself, whether there's a ramp or accessible washrooms, but accessibility can mean a lot more than just that. It can go to: how accessible are any of our programs or services that we provide? How accessible are our Sunday or our church services themselves for all people?

Kristin Ostensen  

What do you think, Colonel Margaret?

Margaret McLeod 

Over the last year or 18 months, as I've worked a little bit with Christine, she has certainly opened up my eyes to the accessibility beyond just physical ramps and the physical doors, and as she has echoed, it's made me think a little bit more about, how do we ensure that inclusivity is happening for everybody? And although we might not actually see a physical disability, how do we ensure that we've got accessibility happening for people that might be visually impaired—and I don't know that for sure? Or hearing impairments—and I don't know that for sure? So, what steps can we be doing to be proactive, so that when those individuals come into our midst, we've already been proactive to say, “You’re welcome here”?

Kristin Ostensen 

Yeah, it's kind of like: how do we actually embed that in our mission itself, not just in sort of the outward things, but the inward identity? And I'm wondering if either of you has some thoughts on that. How is accessibility part of our mission as The Salvation Army, and even our calling to share the gospel?

Margaret McLeod  

I think we're striving. I'm not sure that our striving steps are gazelle steps. I think they might be turtle steps. But I think we're striving for that, to be able to identify for sure where it's happening right across the territory. I think of our recent tour with the international leaders, and one of the steps that we took—and again, it was Christine helping me understand. We had somebody participating in sign giving, sign language, and I think those are the things that we start to embed slowly. They’re not hard to do, but they're hard to think about until it gets into your psyche that we need to be doing it.

Kristin Ostensen

What do you think, Christine?

Christine Johnston  

Yeah, I think as we look at our mission as The Salvation Army, even if we look at our mission statement of “sharing the love of Jesus Christ”—so we don't stipulate in there that we're only sharing the love of Jesus Christ to certain groups of people. It's to all people. So, whether someone might have a disability or not, we want to be able to share that love of Jesus Christ to all people and serve our communities and be a transforming influence. And so, how can we do that as a mission when we're thinking about accessibility? And so, yeah, if we want to look at even in 2 Corinthians, the passage that speaks about the body of Christ, and about all people being part of that body of Christ—even those who we might think, or we might perceive as being weaker, we read in there that we might perceive those as being weaker, but actually they have a very important role to play within the body of Christ.

Kristin Ostensen  

Yeah, absolutely. Yes, we're not all eyes, we're not all ears or hands, and all are part of the body of Christ. And yes, that's such a beautiful image, and so applicable here. Now, Colonel Margaret, you mentioned the signing at the international leaders’ tour, which was very neat, and I appreciated that, even though I'm not part of the Deaf community. But I'm wondering, what might accessibility look for us look like for us as Salvationists in both the corps setting and also in our social mission setting?

Margaret McLeod

When we were in the COVID season, there was a lot of Bible studies online, there was a lot of sermons online, and worship services online for congregational life, and I remember hearing somewhere along the way how much more meaningful that became for some of the people who could now read the closed caption along the bottom of the screen, if steps had been taken to have closed caption on the screen. So, for our congregations who have online services, I wonder if there's an opportunity to be able to provide closed captioning for what's going on, so that they might be able to participate in what's going on from that perspective. In a very similar way, if somebody is coming into one of our social mission units, how do we ensure that we're able to include them in all that's going on? I think, particularly of the visually impaired and the hearing impaired: how do we help somebody in one of those communities if they walk into our place? Do we have somebody on call that could come and assist in any way of what we might need them for? Do we have anything that, for someone who is visually impaired, that in one of our social mission units we might have something that magnifies something that they need to be reading? So, if they need to read a contract, if they need to read what they're signing, do we have something that will help visualize, help magnify what it is they're reading? And those are things that we could make steps towards that I think might help those two particular communities.

Kristin Ostensen  

Yeah, those are good examples. Anything to add there, Christine?

Christine Johnston  

Thinking about in our corps settings, I'll go back to, you know, using that term, “accessibility of the gospel,” and ways that people might express themselves within our church settings. We can sometimes have, you know, an idea or kind of a set pattern or way of expressing ourselves within a worshiping community, at a worship service during church. And so, if someone wants to express themselves in a way that might be a little bit different than what we're used to, how do we build awareness, so that's OK, and where that's not just OK, but encouraged for people to express their own sense of spirituality, their own way of worshiping? And then, of course, in our social mission, similarly, how are we able to fully make that service available to them and accessible to them? And I think also in both corps and social, sometimes we're afraid just to ask the question: how can we make this more accessible for you? Or, what is it that you need from us, so that we can make this accessible for you? And also valuing that person enough that we take what they have to say, and begin to build on that, and apply it. 

Kristin Ostensen  

Yeah. No, I love that. Proactive, you know? Not waiting, and not just thinking about accommodation, but anticipation. I think that's really helpful. So, thank you. Now, we've touched on things that might be more visible, like vision impairment or the need for physical accommodation like ramps. But of course there are many different experiences of disabilities. People with disabilities are not a monolith, so I'm wondering if you have thoughts on how we can apply provide accessibility for people with various needs.

Christine Johnston

Yeah, I've had some people ask me, you know: so, when we're thinking about accessibility, do we need to be accessible to every single person who might have a disability? Because the needs and the varying types of disability—that could be a lot if we think about it in that way, you know. So, I think it's more about having enough awareness that we can be ready to meet a need. And even apart from meeting a need—when we think about it in that terms, we often then go, oh, you know, accessibility is about just meeting need, and so therefore it's almost a transactional piece, whereas we don't want it to be transactional—we want to be able to, for it to be relational; it's about having that relationship. And you know, when we think about people with disability, often—and I'll include myself in this as well, because I have some personal experience with disability—so, you know, we would say that we want to have the same accessibility as others, to be treated and to be respected in the same way as others. So, looking at accessibility really means having that inclusivity, but also a welcoming environment. We think about the concept of hospitality, so having that welcoming environment, I just think is so important.

Kristin Ostensen  

And that ties well into my next question, which is that sometimes, you know, disabilities are non-visible, and it can actually take a lot of vulnerability for people to share. So I'm wondering if either of you have thoughts on how we can actually create that welcoming, that safe space to say, “You know, actually, I do have this experience,” and you know, to feel like it's OK to have that vulnerability in our churches and our social units.

Margaret McLeod  

I'm going to jump on what Christine said about the welcoming community, the hosting of a good community. And when I think of congregational settings that I've been in—in some congregational settings, as soon as I walk in the front door, somebody comes over and says, “Hi, how are you? Welcome to wherever we are. Here's a bulletin,” you know. “If you need anything—if you need the washrooms, the washrooms are down around the corner. If we can help you out, if you need a drinking fountain, it's over there.” So, it's somebody welcoming me in. And I think in some of those immediate interactions, if I'm feeling safe, I might be able to say, “Actually, I'm wondering if you have—.” If by chance I was to arrive in a congregational setting, and I haven't been welcomed in the front door, and I haven't been welcomed into the sanctuary, chances are that I probably won't feel as welcomed, to be able to say, “I need some assistance with—.” 

Christine Johnston

Yes, I agree very much with Colonel Margaret in that, as we welcome people into a space and being very aware of wanting to listen well to people, right, instead of it just being a quick “how are you,” you know, “come on in,” you know, kind of piece. But really actually connecting with someone. And I think also as we, as people in leadership, within our social service settings, or within corps, people in leadership, if they set that example of vulnerability, then I think that goes a long way for other people seeing, “Oh, you know what, I have seen this person share about something.” And I'm not saying we'd have to be an open book in every circumstance, but being that example of vulnerability, I think, goes a very long way. And when people see someone with, you know, a visible disability or an invisible disability, when they experience someone in leadership that might have a disability, and that just opens up the door so much more, that, Oh, they have, you know, someone maybe in their worship team with some type of disability, and you know, using that example. And so that just really opens up the space then for people to be able to come in and see, Oh, you know, this is a space where I can be comfortable, where I can fit in, where I'm not going to be seen as the person who is different.

Kristin Ostensen  

Yeah, that is so true. You know, a friend of mine once commented about churches generally, that you go where you're where you're wanted, and I think that's really what we're getting at here. From that moment that you walk in the door, that sense that, yes, I am wanted here, just as I am. And certainly seeing that in leadership as well—it makes it OK for us to be who we are when our leaders are who they are, and I love that both of you brought up those points. Now, just thinking about your role, as you mentioned, Christine, you are the territorial disabilities consultant, and that is relatively new for us, but it's great. So, I'm wondering if you and perhaps Margaret, as well, can talk a bit about why it was created and what you are doing in that role.

Christine Johnston 

When we look at our, certainly within our Canadian population, our Stats Canada would say that we have 27% of our population that has a disability. So, when we think about those kind of numbers, that's a large portion of population.

Kristin Ostensen

Yeah.

Christine Johnston

So, the need—I believe that there is a need to have this type of role that can just help to—it's not a role that's a be-all-and-end-all. It's not a role that I can do without, you know, any other help from anyone else. My experience in disability, you know, is I have some personal experience, some ministry experience, but even within that, it's limited. And so, gathering others around who can help with that is very important. And I do believe that our Salvation Army leadership within the territory has recognized a need, and that when we're thinking about accessibility and belonging, that it is something that, as part of our mission, we do need to be thinking about and being active in and working toward that.

Margaret McLeod 

I would agree, I would concur with what Christine has said. When I think of the title of territorial disabilities consultant role, I think of the word consultant, and consultant is to gain experience from; it's to seek somebody that's got a little bit more knowledge than some of the rest of us. And so I think in the consulting piece, our leadership has felt the need to have somebody with a little bit more of a focus that we can go to, to consult to say, Can you just help us think through how we might be able to do a little bit better in this area?

Kristin Ostensen

Yeah, no, that's a good point. And people might not know that that resource is available, and so you know, trying to just even build that awareness through things like this podcast is so important. And folks might also not know that we have a territorial accessibility and belonging committee, and Christine, you chair that, and I'm wondering if you can talk also about what the purpose of that committee is, and what has it been working on.

Christine Johnston

So, yes, it's a very new committee—we've had just one official meeting so far—but my aim when developing this committee was really to bring people on board who have experience of disability, of a variety of disabilities. So, we have people with seen/visible disabilities, we have people with invisible disabilities, people who have family members with various types of disability. So that piece was very important to me, of having—because, like I said, I can't represent every person with a disability, so having others that can be working on this is very important. So, one of the things, primarily, that our first kind of task that we're wanting to do is to really get a picture of, what does accessibility and belonging look like within our territory right now? Where are we at? Where are we doing really well? Where are we not doing so well? What is people's experience, who we might serve within our social settings, or people within our corps settings? What is their experience with accessibility and belonging? So, we really want to be able to survey that, and I know the idea of doing surveys—sometimes we get a lot of surveys going on, and so sometimes I think they may not be as effective as we would like them to be. But one of the things that I really would like to be able to do as well is not just survey, not just gather numbers, but really gather people's experience, kind of their story, because I think that can speak and add a lot more value than just numbers. And so, that's primarily right now what the committee is looking at doing.

Kristin Ostensen  

Yeah, it is so important to gather that lived experience. And thinking about lived experience in our ministry units, I'm wondering, where have you seen exemplary ministry to folks with disabilities in the accessibility realm in our territory?

Christine Johnston  

We do have kind of pockets of places that are doing very well. When we think about accessibility in a physical capacity, we have some of our structures that—they might be newer structures that certainly are more fully accessible. We also have, I know that some of our older structures that have set money aside and they are working on accessibility. We have some congregations within our ministry within our territory that have really put together some steps to be more welcoming, to accept people and accept others for who they are, and to build on that idea of welcoming. In our social settings, I think about where I'm chaplain, so we do have social service settings where we serve people specifically with disability, and I think there's so much that we can learn from them—people who have, you know, have that professional or/and experiential background that they're able to bring, and I believe that there's so much that we can learn from them, from places that are already doing this work.

Kristin Ostensen 

And Margaret, you mentioned the signing during the visit. I'm wondering, are there any examples of ministry that come to your mind, given your travels across the territory?

Margaret McLeod  

I think of my home congregation at Scarborough, and we've got somebody that, on a somewhat regular basis, is signing in our congregation, and I think that's when I first became aware of it, when I started to worship at Scarborough, and thought, "Oh, we should be doing a better job of that,” and I'm assuming that we've probably got other congregations who might be including interpretation, signing. I'm mindful of individuals who are stimulated, or their sensories are stimulated, and so coming into a congregation where their sensories are stimulated by flashing lights or by loud music, I'm mindful that some places are becoming aware of that, and I think because they've probably got individuals within the congregation who have put up their hand to say, “I, my husband, my wife, my son, my daughter, my cousin—this is impacting how they worship. Is there any way that we could turn the volume down just a little bit?” And I think those things are starting to happen.

Christine Johnston

Yeah, when we think about that, you know, Colonel Margaret, you were talking about the stimulation, you know, and, yes, there are various disabilities that, they get overstimulated by noise, auditory or by something visual, something that overloads their senses, you know. And one of the things actually that I probably hear the most is how we, even in our worship services, how we display things on a screen. When we're displaying words for a song, there might be something very artistic happening in the background, you know, there might be moving pictures, or words that flip and things like that. But those are the types of things that, yeah, we do want to stay away from those kinds of things. There's various types of disability that are affected. And then I've also heard from people, as they get older, that they just have a hard time reading on a screen at all, so, you know, are we able to provide hard copies, paper copies, sometimes for people? And if I'm going to my home church, and every Sunday it's a challenge for me to read a screen, that just gets very tiresome—like, not just emotionally tiresome, but mentally tiresome, tiresome for my system. So, I think that as we become more aware of disability, as we become more aware of accessibility and belonging, just having that attitude of being flexible and open to doing what we can. Sometimes they're very simple things of, yeah, we can print off songs for someone on a paper in large print. And they're often not things that take a lot of effort; they're often not things that take a lot of time or of money as well. 

Kristin Ostensen

Yeah, that's a really good point. And so far, we've talked a bit about ways that we can create accessible spaces. Accessibility ministry can sometimes look a bit more like ministry to—and that is very important and very valuable. But I wonder if you have thoughts on how we can engage people with disabilities, so that it's also ministry by and with.

Christine Johnston  

Someone might have, yes, a disability, but they also have spiritual gifts, right? So, what are those spiritual gifts? What are their skills? What are their abilities? I know of a woman who has, yes, an intellectual disability, but she also loves music and has a musical ability, and so in her church she has been invited to participate in the worship team, and they have worked with her so that she can participate in that. And so, what would it look like for us to have someone with disability in leadership in any of our ministry units? We probably already have that, right? In many ways, we probably already have that, but we may not have fully embraced that idea of having someone with disability within leadership or serving. Often, people with disability—you know, part of our humanity is to have purpose and to be able to give into the communities that we live, and so that is very similar—people with disability also want those things. Very often, they want to be able to serve in some way, they want to have a purpose within their community. So, I think that's very important for us, when we think about ministry by and ministry with, that we begin to discover, you know, what people's gifts are—what are their skills, what are their abilities, what are the things that they enjoy doing? And being able to build on that and support them within those roles.

Kristin Ostensen  

Yeah, absolutely. We've talked about a few practical examples along the way, but when we're thinking about what our ministry units could do for perhaps first steps, or maybe they've taken first steps and want to take second or third steps, what would you suggest for those ministry units as sort of some foundations to lay? And also perhaps, what kind of resources are available in our territory to take some of those steps? 

Margaret McLeod  

It starts with leadership, right? So, whether it's at the level of leadership I'm at, whether it's our divisional leadership, whether it's an executive board in a social mission unit, whether it's an administrative board in one of our congregations—I do think there's opportunities that are quite available to start the conversation at that level, right? And starting a conversation around one of those boards is inexpensive. We'll put it on an agenda item, and we say, so let's start this conversation. There's an extremely good number of book resources, or podcast resources, that in that same way leadership teams could say, what I'd like you to do is read this or listen to this, and at our next meeting we're going to have part of our meeting to talk about this. How can we include that in our ministry unit? That becomes an inexpensive way to be able to start the conversation, and it allows then the opening up of our eyes, to be able to look around and say, “I never thought about that. What can we do?” And I think that then thrusts us into: I never thought about that, and what can we do? We can do ABC. Sometimes it costs a lot, sometimes it costs a little bit, but what can we do? And I think starting the conversation of “What can we do?” is a huge step to take.

Christine Johnston

Yes, as we look at maybe some of those first steps—certainly, as a faith-based mission of The Salvation Army, looking at, what does Scripture tell us about accessibility? It may not use that word, but what examples do we see of Jesus connecting with people who might live maybe on those fringes of society, people who may have disability or differences in their life? So, I think that's a really good first step as well, of really looking at Scripture and allowing that to guide us. And then I love, of course, as you were saying, Colonel Margaret, of bringing that to the table of our boards and our committees, and within a corps or within a ministry unit—bringing that topic forward, and looking at it, and listening then to our boards, listening to our communities—whether that's a faith community, you know, our congregational life; whether that's in a ministry unit, in one of our social settings. But then listening well to people, and what is their experience? Where can we be doing better? What have we done well? And then yes, there are a number of resources, lots of resources that I could put people in touch with: websites, books, guides, all sorts of things that, yes, if people are wanting to begin this conversation, then I can certainly give people some ideas, and also that we do have on our corps mission website and on the community mission website, we can point people to that, and there are resources there as well.

Kristin Ostensen  

Wonderful, and yes, we can certainly link that in the show notes as well, so there will be those resources ready available for our listeners. Well, thank you both so much. This has been a great conversation. I found it thought-provoking, and I hope our listeners have, too. And I just want to thank you both for helping to make this a priority for our territory.

Christine Johnston

Thank you so much. It was a pleasure to be here.

Margaret McLeod  

Thank you for the opportunity, Kristin.

Kristin Ostensen  

Thanks for joining us for another episode of the Salvationist podcast. Be sure to check out the show notes for more resources. For more episodes, visit Salvationist.ca/podcast.