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Did you know that I can hear people chewing across a crowded room? It’s true. And irritating. I can hear lights and electrical currents, too. When I’m in social situations for too long, my ability to speak becomes severely impaired for hours afterward. I can quickly see the outcome of different choices and decisions, which can be a good thing—but has also landed me in trouble more than once.
I’ve spent my entire life dealing with these issues. But I never really knew why I had to at all. It wasn’t until Emily and I noticed areas where our eldest child was struggling that we began searching for the answer. As we researched and worked with our medical team, the pieces started to fall into place. We had an answer. And not just for our child, but also for me. She is on the autism spectrum.1
I am too.
I’ve largely been quiet about my diagnosis. (Publicly at any rate). This isn’t because I’m ashamed in any way. Rather, I felt it important that, if I were to say something, it needed to be helpful for the whole church. And this means I needed to take my time—to read, study, pray, and seek to understand my own experiences, as well as the experiences of others. The result is a first step into a larger conversation. Lord willing, it will be a helpful one.
What is Autism?
Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a complex developmental condition that involves “persistent challenges with social communication, restricted interests, and repetitive behavior.”2 It is an impairment of executive function and self-regulation skills, meaning our ability to perform tasks and cope with situations and stimuli that require minimal effort for the average person.
Complex is one of the most important words we need to embrace as we seek to understand autism. Because it is complex, there are many misconceptions about it. Autism is not a disease or mental illness, and it is not caused by vaccines. It is not a fad or whatever else it’s labeled on certain corners of the internet. Autism cannot be cured with medications, dietary changes, or behavioral therapies. Autism is the result of an individual’s brain developing atypically. As a result, we experience the world differently.
So while there are some shared traits, there is no uniform autistic experience. The degree of impairment changes from person to person, at least partly based on the presence of other conditions, including attention-deficit/hyperactive disorder (ADHD), sleep disorders, depression, anxiety, and learning disabilities. This is why it’s often said that if you’ve met one autistic person, you’ve met one autistic person. Some might more closely resemble the stereotypes perpetuated by pop culture. Some may have limited communication abilities or noticeably atypical movements and posture. And some may be able to “mask” their tendencies so well that you might only think of them as being a little quirky.
I tend to fall into this latter category. I spent years compensating for most of my traits well enough that I didn’t even know that I was on the spectrum for most of my life. What I couldn’t compensate for I chalked up to being extremely introverted. But not everyone has this experience. Many people with autism cannot compensate easily or at all. And even for those who can, compensating doesn’t mean we are immune to the toll our impairments take.
Autistic Traits and Our Experience of Faith
Even though there is no uniform experience, autistic people do have some shared traits. And these traits affect our experience of the Christian faith and life as part of the church.
For example, autistic people tend to be more morally rigid than neurotypical individuals.3 This means we do not struggle with the concept of an objective right and wrong. But we may struggle with showing grace to those who fail to live up to the standards we’ve been taught—or those we set for ourselves.
Many of us can connect the dots between different aspects of the Bible’s teaching more quickly than others. (Pattern recognition skills!) However, we can also be too fixated on a pattern that may not actually be present, and risk becoming needlessly dogmatic.
We have strong emotions, but we don’t always know how to express them in ways the average person understands. So many of us live in constant fear of being misunderstood or rejected.
We are prone to sensory overload. Certain sounds, smells, and even textures can overwhelm us. Additionally, if we have a reduced capacity for social interaction, just showing up for any gathering can be challenging.
We tend to be extremely routine-oriented, with a high need for consistency. We can be flexible when it’s necessary (though, again, it costs us), but unpredictability breaks us.
And for many, there is a disconnect between our experience of our bodies and our being. It can feel at times as though our souls weren’t installed correctly, which is why many struggle with societally conditioned and/or constructed gender stereotypes and roles.4
All of these matter because they all affect our experience of life as believers and within the church. And all are opportunities for our brothers and sisters in Christ to come alongside us.
Loving Our Autistic Brothers, Sisters, and Neighbors
So how can you come alongside us—and along caregivers of those who are significantly more impaired? Even the idea can seem overwhelming depending on the picture of autism we have in our heads. But consider the following:
Be kind and curious. You can do this by educating yourself about neurological and developmental disorders using credible sources. There are plenty of excellent books, such as Is This Autism? A Guide for Clinicians and Everyone Else, which can be a bit technical at times, but is worth the investment. But curiosity is more than reading books. It’s about being involved with people. Talk to someone who is on the spectrum or their caregivers like you would anyone else. Ask about our experiences—and not just about what’s challenging, but about how we see God at work in and through our differences. Ask how you can help. Even if there’s not an obvious way, showing that kind of kindness and curiosity—dare I say, empathy—go a long way.
Be sensory sensitive. I wear noise-cancelling earbuds when I’m in public. I need to turn down the volume on the world to be able to function. This means worship gatherings can be difficult, especially when the volume frequently exceeds 90 decibels. But it’s not just volume. Lighting, screens, and all the other trappings of church in North America can pose a challenge. So consider how your church can be more sensory sensitive. Can you lower the volume? Simplify the visual production? Whatever efforts you can make, your autistic brothers and sisters will be grateful.
Be consistent. That is, we must practice what we preach—and keep practicing it. While it’s a broader topic, much of the evangelical church’s credibility crisis stems from our failure in this regard—our hypocrisy of the sort Jesus condemned (Matthew 23:3). Loving our autistic brothers and sisters in this regard looks the same as loving our unbelieving neighbors: earnestly repenting of this sin, and pursuing consistency as we seek to follow and proclaim Christ in the world.
A consistency-related excurses
Related to consistency is our need to keep proclaiming and demonstrating the inherent goodness of our being born male or female. And by this, I mean we need to stop being superficial or overly simplistic—a problem on both sides of the intramural debates within Christian circles. If all our talk is about who can or cannot do one thing over another, who leads vs who follows, who does what sort of work, and so forth, we’ve already lost the plot. Go deeper, explore Scripture, and celebrate the goodness of our differences that, together, allow us to flourish as God’s image bearers.
Autistic People are a Gift
Ultimately, I need you to know that autistic people are a gift to the church and the world. Our quirks are part of God’s good design. We see and experience things a little differently. We have perceptions and perspectives others need to hear and can help all of us grow in our faith.
And this includes those who are significantly more impaired than I appear to be—those who have more obvious traits and tendencies, or may not be able to verbally communicate at all. Those limitations do not change our value because they are a gift in themselves. They are often a burden, without question, but they are not a burden for us to carry alone. We and caregivers of autistic people need to be able to let others in on the struggles we face, to allow others to carry the load to the degree that they can (Galatians 6:2).
After all, this is how we were meant to live. It’s how the world knows that we belong to Jesus: Our love for one another defines us. It’s what says to the weary and heavy-laden that we are different. That we are a safe place, and a safe people. So let’s strive toward that.
- This is shared with her permission. ↩︎
- “Psychiatry.org – What Is Autism Spectrum Disorder?,” https://www.psychiatry.org/patients-families/autism/what-is-autism-spectrum-disorder. ↩︎
- To be neurotypical means to not be characterized by or display autistic traits or other atypical patterns of thought and behavior. ↩︎
- This, at least in part, explains the high crossover between people with autism and those who experience gender dysphoria, although correlation does not equal causation. See, Lindsay Weisner Psy.D., “Psychology Today – The Link Between Autism and Gender Diversity, “https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-venn-diagram-life/202307/the-link-between-autism-and-gender-diversity. ↩︎
Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash
Thanks for this Aaron. As a someone with autistic grandchildren and nephews this is very encouraging to be able to share with others. Thanks for being such a blessing to the church.