Autistic banned from Mass

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They did him a favour as far as I'm concerned

I am a Christian, and I am sad to hear that he was banned from church.

On the other hand, it clearly wasn't doing him any good, and keeping him there was hurting the congregation.

The only thing that worries me is that his family will now lose another tie to what they consider normalcy, and trace that directly back to their kid's autism. Then they'll say that autism is horrible and robbed them of everything good in their lives.

Autistic banned from Mass

Well, it's pretty clear that autism cannot be allowed to get in the way of a non-profit, tax-exempt Church from Europe asking for money from pewrenters each week.

http://www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_off ... tnerships/

http://www.beliefnet.com/

I was banned from a church once. Not legally, but officially ostracized. I wasn't prevented from entering during services, but everyone was under orders to not associate or interact with me.

It messes with your head.

Paradoxically, it deepened my faith in God, even as it stripped me of my faith in humanity. But that's another story entirely.

I think the church had no choice because the parents kept taking him there. If the boy couldn't behave there, the parents shouldn't have kept bringing him there. So the church had no choice but take it to court to protect all the other people who attend.

i know That kids Brother Who has aspergers and he said they found a new Church however that was a summer ago
no idea how he is doing no

America is like a different planet, over here catholics are a lot more reasonable than what I hear about them in europe. My area is about 30% Italian, we have catholics all over the place, and they never gave me any problems.

It seems to me that many people are seeing this story as:

Step 1: Autistic child has a meltdown
Step 2: Church obtains a court order.

The reality is likely that there were a number steps in between these two, involving attempts to find some form of accommodation. Perhaps the Church did not go far enough. Perhaps the parent refused all accommodation options.

But at the end of the day, a congregation is a private entity that is entitled to set rules for the people who attend on their property, whether it be for services, or for other purposes.

I had to find the article on this one.

The boy is over 200 pounds and his parents are not able to physically restrain him.

He bolts from mass unexpectedly and knocks people over.

The church felt the physical safety of the other parishioners was at risk.

The mother disputed that.

The story is over 2 years old; due to the lack of follow up interest, it would seem something got settled out.

My take: in any situation, the needs of ALL people present need to be balanced. A priest can say all he wants that everyone is welcome, but if my child is interrupting people's ability to pray, I am not going to leave him in that situation; I took my crying babies out of church, and I did not take my son to church at all when I knew he could not reach a reasonable compromise level of behavior. Thankfully, we found alternatives that worked for everyone, and most parents do. Sometimes you have to do a little extra work to find those alternatives, but that is part of the job when you parent a special needs child. As easy as it is to say everyone should be accepting of everyone, there are times that just doesn't fly, and church with hundreds of people trying to pray is, to me, one of them. Being realistic about how one child can interfere with their rights is not the equivalent of saying people should not accept that child; it is simply recognition that there is nothing in this world that does not require a little bit of a balancing act.

All that said, that this situation ever reached the level of involving a legal action astounds me. In my life to date, all that little stuff has been negotiated out as needed, by the people involved. They listen to me, and I listen to them.

I don't think he was banned for being autistic, but for the disruptive behavior caused by the autism. Non-autistics would be banned for doing similar things. Perhaps they could explain the thing to their priest, and maybe he can get mass in a different place. Or maybe he doesn't like church, and shouldn't be forced to go. Some people just don't like being religious.