Autism: Resources – Equipping

Theology and Autism

View or download the slides from our February workshop led by Jonathan.

Meltdowns

View or download the slides from our January workshop.

From the October 2022 workshop

The autistic experience of music

View or download the slides from our October workshop.

From the July 2022 workshop

Pathological Demand Avoidance
What is it – and how might spiritual maturity help?

View or download the slides from our July workshop.

From the June 2022 workshop

Multiple Theologies? How are we ‘autistics’ to cope?

View or download the slides from our June workshop.

From the April 2022 workshop

Expectations, hopes and disappointments: a perspective for autistic Christians

View or download the slides and notes from our April workshop.

From the January 2022 workshop

Reading the Bible appropriately

In our January workshop Anthony shared some thoughts on how to read the Bible. We looked at what questions we ask, as well as the use of inductive and deductive thinking.

From the November 2021 workshop

Massification, Anonymity, Closeness

In our November workshop Peter shared some thoughts on the nature of community and what it means to be part of a ‘crowd (or even a church community)’, but without losing one’s identity. We had a good discussion around the questions that Peter posed – concluding that, generally, on visiting a new church, we would like to be given functional information (where to sit etc), but not to be talked to about anything requiring a commitment to engage with that particular church – that should be left for us to volunteer, if appropriate and given time.

From the October 2021 workshop

The Good Samaritan

In one of our workshops Piers shared some personal reflections on this well-known Bible story from Luke 10. Piers describes how his reading of the text led to a very practical response to a difficult situation. 

Jesus tells this story in order to answer the question, “Who is my neighbour?”  The answer in the context would have almost certainly been something that included the presumption ‘well, not any Samaritan, for a start’. 

Piers shares his own perspective on this story and reflects on how different people behaved in the incident that he encountered. He then invites us to think about how we would respond both to the words of Jesus in the text and to a situation such as the contemporary events that he describes.

From the September 2021 workshop

Framing

Framing – the way in which (either consciously or otherwise) what we communicate is very much set in the context of certain attitudes and expectations – was examined by Louise in one of our regular Bible interpretation workshops. The media, and particularly those involved in advertising, use these techniques all of the time. 

Louise highlighted some research that suggests that autistic people are less likely (than neurotypical people) to be aware of and influenced by ‘framing statements’ – and that this may actually result in them making more consistent decisions in some contexts.

Louise helpfully extended the application of this idea of ‘framing’ into the church context where, for example, the content of sermons may well containing framing about ’the Christian message’ and so on.

Video recording of the July 2021 Zoom workshop

Video recording of the May 2021 Zoom workshop

Video recording of the April 2021 Zoom workshop

Video recording of the March 2021 Zoom workshop

Video recording of the February 2021 Zoom workshop

Video recording of the November 2020 Zoom workshop

Video recording of the first Zoom workshop led by Stewart Rapley in September 2020