In an interview with Christian Daily International, Mark Arnold - also known as the additional needs blogfather - shares valuable insights into what it means for churches to provide a welcoming environment for children with special needs. “Jesus spent a disproportionate amount of time with people who today we would say had additional needs, and he teaches us important things in many of these encounters,” he says.
CDI: Thank you for taking the time to share with us about children with special needs. Could you first tell us a bit about yourself, your family and your ministry?
Hi, I’m Mark, married to Clare, Dad to Phoebe (25) who is married and works in full-time ministry for Friends International, and James (22) who is the inspiration and driver for much of the work I do as he is Autistic, has Learning Disability, Epilepsy, Anxiety, and more.
My ’day job’ is Additional Needs Ministry Director at Urban Saints, a UK based Christian children’s and youth organisation. I help churches include, support, value and cherish children and young people with additional (special) needs and disabilities. That involves developing and delivering lots of training, speaking at conferences, writing books and blogs, doing media work, and building communities of like-minded people.
I am co-founder of the Additional Needs Alliance, a collective of thousands of children’s, youth, and families workers, as well as practitioners, parents, carers and guardians of children and young people with additional needs. I also founded The Dads’ Fire Circle, a place where fathers of children with additional needs can gather, share their journeys, encourage and support each other.
CDI: Could you explain what the term additional needs or special needs children means?
Approximately one in five children and young people have special or additional needs. It’s a big area that includes disabled children, children with serious or long-term health conditions (physical or mental), and children that need extra support to learn and develop alongside their peers.
Here in the UK, where we use the term additional needs more widely than special needs, it can also be referred to as additional learning needs, or additional support needs, which are helpful descriptors to explain a bit more of what we are talking about.
CDI: Could you describe some challenges special needs children face in the Church? Is there anything that stands out to you currently?
Every child or young person is different, but there are common challenges that children and young people with additional or special needs can encounter in church. I have split them up into three categories; physical, programme, and people:
Physical: These are what most people think of when considering what challenges a child with additional needs might experience in church. Here we’re talking about how to get in to the building if they have a physical or mobility disability, how to navigate around the building once they (hopefully) can get in, can they use a disabled toilet, is the environment too loud, the lighting too bright. Is there somewhere in the room they can access in a wheelchair to take part in the programme.
Programme: Barriers in this category include sudden or unexpected changes to the programme, or being asked to take part without prior warning and agreement. It can also include poorly thought through programmes, an example being a session where they have lots of loud, physical, activities without any quieter, gentler, alternatives.
People: Every church has a ‘hugger’ and they usually end up on the welcome team. For a child or young person with additional needs, their hugs may be unwelcome at best, or painful and triggering at worst. People often put unrealistic expectations on children and young people with additional needs around things like eye contact, sitting still, not talking, etc. which some children with additional needs find impossible to meet.
CDI: What are some good examples of how churches have welcomed and accommodated the needs of these children and their families?
There are great examples of churches that have been willing to adapt to meet the needs of children and young people with additional needs. St. Paul’s Church in the city of St. Albans, just north of London, is one example.
They embraced the need for an ‘Inclusion Champion’ to ensure that the church focussed on how to include every child and young person. This role serves as a bridge between parents and team, helping parents to highlight their child’s needs, and supporting the team to put the necessary adaptations in place. They have seen a huge increase in the number of families with children with additional needs coming to their church as a result.
One family who go to St. Paul’s Church, and whose daughter Bethany has additional needs, told us that Bethany loves coming to church and asks when she is going to church next. You can see more of Bethany’s story, as well as other families stories and the ways their churches supported them, in the video below:
CDI: How does the situation in the UK compare to other countries in the world?
Although I sometimes get frustrated at the slow pace of change in the UK church, I must also recognise that the situation here is far better than it is in most countries in the world. There is a public awareness, acceptance, and increasing understanding of additional needs here in the UK that just doesn’t exist in a lot of places. In many parts of the world it can be considered shameful, or a judgement, to have a child with additional needs, a viewpoint that is rare in the UK.
There is still much to do here in the UK, however; still too many churches that treat children and young people with additional needs, and their families, poorly. I hear stories of children being turned away from churches because of the fear that they might be a health and safety risk. But whereas churches with those views were a sizeable group even 10 years ago, they are a small minority now. Most churches in the UK are either already providing the much needed support that children with additional needs and their families require, or are seeking help with a heart to do so.
CDI: In what areas do you see visible progress and what areas you think still need more attention?
There is an increasing understanding of neurodiversity in the church now, especially for children and young people, more than there was a few years ago. People are more aware that an Autistic child who is overwhelmed is struggling due to brain overload rather than being deliberately naughty. Churches are seeking training, and exploring what they can do to help church to be a safe, inclusive, caring place for neurodivergent children and young people.
The focus on neurodiversity over the last few years may, however, have come at the cost of other areas of additional needs. There is still more to do to create accessibility and inclusion in churches for children and young people with a physical mobility disability, for example, and many churches still struggle to support children and young people with mental health conditions.
The work to create accessibility, inclusion, and belonging for every child and young person, whatever additional needs they may have, goes on.
CDI: If a church would like to address the barriers that additional needs children face what would you suggest the first step should be?
Ask them and their families what would be helpful. So often, when thinking about how to support a particular demographic group in our churches, we forget to actually ask them! We end up doing inclusion ‘unto’ people, rather than ‘with’ them. Always ask the children and young people, and their families, to work with you on this; to share with you what barriers they face at church, what they find hard, and what ideas they might have to break those barriers down.
Alongside this, have someone that owns this within the team, an ‘Inclusion Champion’ like Karen from St. Paul’s Church in the video clip that I shared the link to earlier. If churches don’t have someone that can act on what families, and the children and young people themselves, are sharing with them, the risk is that it slips off the priority list and nothing meaningfully changes.
CDI: Is there anything you would like churches to remember when it comes to children with additional needs?
This mattered to Jesus during his ministry on Earth, and I believe it matters to him still. He spent a disproportionate amount of time with people who today we would say had additional needs, and he teaches us important things in many of these encounters. When Bartimaeus, a man who was blind, came to him, Jesus asked him “What do you want me do to for you?” (Mark 10:46-52); Jesus didn’t assume that he knew, he asked Bartimaeus; he let Bartimaeus say for himself what he wanted Jesus to do for him. We should do the same.
When parents brought their children to Jesus, and the disciples tried to stop them, Jesus said “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.” (Matthew 19:14). He didn’t go on to say “Except that one that can’t walk, or the one there that shouts and makes a lot of noise, or that one who is struggling with anxiety…” Jesus invited them all to come to him, and we should invite, include, and love all children and young people, whatever additional needs they may have, as we welcome them into our churches in Jesus’ name.
If I can be of any help to you as you explore this in your own church context, do contact me via [email protected]. I look forward to hearing from you.
