July 2013

Who I'm Reading: an Introduction to Ellen Painter DollarAn introduction to blogger Ellen Painter Dollar, who writes about faith, parenting, ethics, and disability

Readers who are familiar with this blog will recognize my friend and colleague Ellen Painter Dollar. She and I met through an online debate about whether or not disability should be cured (see my piece for Christianity Today and Ellen's response), and we've continued the dialogue ...

Who I'm Reading: Rachel Marie StoneAn introduction to one of my favorite bloggers you might not yet know--Rachel Marie Stone on food, faith, Candy Land, and Malawi.

I'm on vacation this week, so I want to take the opportunity to introduce you to three of my favorite bloggers. I've mentioned each of them on this blog before, but I'm going to give them a chance to introduce themselves and share some of their favorite posts. Later this week, ...

What I'm Reading and Tweeting: More on Abortion, Christian Wiman, Casual Sex, and Down syndrome

In addition to tweets mentioning articles I've read and appreciated this past week, I want to share a quotation from a book I just started by Wendell Berry, The Hidden Wound. I wonder whether those of us who are white people struggling to think about and understand the reaction ...

Three Reasons Why We Might Not Want to Cure Down SyndromeScientists think they have discovered a way to "silence" the chromosome that causes Down syndrome. We should be jumping for joy, right? I'm not so sure.

There's a new scientific discovery popping up on my Google alerts about a potential "cure" for Down syndrome. According to the Boston Globe (Scientists Hit at Core of Down Syndrome), "Researchers at the University of Massachusetts Medical School have shown that it is possible ...

Bridging the Abortion Divide, in conversation with Ellen Painter DollarHow can pro-life and pro-choice people talk to each other when our political and media representatives speak so the other side can't listen?

Last week I wrote for her.meneutics about the woman with a prenatal diagnosis of Down syndrome who decided to carry her pregnancy to term after a priest intervened and offered to find adoptive parents for the child (A Real Happily-Ever-After for Babies with Down Syndrome). In ...

What I'm Tweeting: On Trayvon Martin, Abortion, the Bible, and More

Here's a roundup of tweets from this past week, including links to articles you might appreciate. Happy reading!

The Girls Who Haven't Come Home: One mother fighting to get her daughters out of#FosterCare ow.ly/mQCK7 @nytimes#BrokenHome

"At 80, I often feel #life is about to begin, ...

You're Pregnant. How Do You Decide About Prenatal Testing?" I had treated the decision to accept prenatal genetic testing as an inconsequential matter that required minimal discomfort and no risk to my health. But I now realized that my initial decision could lead to a series of life-changing ethical, emotional, and spiritual choices that I wasn't prepared to make."

"It's noninvasive," my doctor said. "It just offers you some information about your baby."

I was 28-years-old, pregnant for the first time, and we were discussing prenatal testing. A simple noninvasive blood test sounded good to me, so I stuck out ...

Happily Ever After, with Down SyndromeA priest gives a woman who planned to abort her fetus with Down syndrome the option of adoption. Jezebel accuses him of coercion. But maybe this type of action is one way out of the politicized and polarized abortion wars.

Last week, the news came out about a pregnant woman in Maryland who discovered through prenatal testingthat her fetus had Down syndrome. She planned to abort—the same choice made by at least 3 in 4 women who receive this diagnosis—until a local priest intervened, offering to ...

What Trayvon Martin and Ethan Saylor Have in CommonTrayvon Martin and Ethan Saylor are both young men who died a tragic death. Why don't we know more about what happened with Saylor?

Trayvon Martin was an African-American. He was walking home from the 7-11. George Zimmerman thought he posed a threat, and he ended up shooting him dead. Zimmerman claims he shot Martin in self-defense. He was acquitted of both second-degree murder and manslaughter charges. At ...

What I'm Tweeting

Interesting articles from the past week:

Church flooded with calls to adopt baby with #downsyndrome who would have been aborted: http://abcn.ws/1aimhgO

Find out why #women are key to America's#prosperity #WarrenBuffet ow.ly/mB40F@CNNMoney

 "#LearningToLove Your Sinful Neighbor"ow.ly/mB4TG#LiveLikeChrist ...

Do You Listen to Audiobooks? (If so, A Good and Perfect Gift is now available...)A Good and Perfect Gift joins the trend by becoming an audiobook...

My first book on tape was Tom Sawyer. My dad and I listened to it on cassette tape one summer when we drove from North Carolina to Connecticut together. It was a treat, and apparently I paid attention because I still remember the story in detail.

Still, audiobooks were never ...

Getting to Know My DaughterHow a double ear infection and six doctor's visits became an answer to prayer...

Earlier this spring, I set my alarm for 6:00 so I could make a cup of tea and sit in our dining room and read and pray and spend some time with God. I began to jot a few prayer requests down in my journal. They began: "For help paying attention to Marilee. I worry that she gets ...

Reading Our Humanity: Karen Swallow Prior RespondsKaren Swallow Prior responds to my concerns about her essay for The Atlantic regarding reading, intelligence, and what makes us human.

Yesterday, I wrote about my concerns with the idea that "reading makes us more human." Today, my friend and colleague Karen Swallow Prior, who wrote a post for the Atlantic (How Reading Makes Us More Human) about this topic, responds to my concerns:

AJ: I resonate with your point ...

Reading Our Humanity: Some Thoughts on Intelligence, Disability, and What Makes Us HumanDoes reading enhance our humanity? Why I agree, and why the idea concerns me...

I love reading. I've always loved reading. My mom says I taught myself to read, as if language fell out of the sky and into my head in the form of the English alphabet. I devoured books as a kid, priding myself on reading chapter books from beginning to end more than once, challenging ...

Abortion, the Cult of Youth, and Networks of Care (What I'm Tweeting)

We were on vacation last week, so I missed my weekly tweeting post, but I want to recommend the following articles:

"We made sure our son was not born only to suffer" ow.ly/mlewd "My #Abortion, at 23 Weeks" @nytimes #Pregnancy#PrenatalTesting

A woman's refusal to dye her gray hair ...

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