By Carol Zimmermann
Today, World Autism Awareness Day, is a fitting time to consider the impact of autism on family life as acutely by Mark Osteen, an English professor at Loyola University Maryland, and highlighted here in the university’s magazine.
Osteen, is the author of ”One of Us: A Family’s Life with Autism,” a 2010 book which chronicles the challenges of raising his autistic son Cameron.
The Loyola magazine notes that one of the book’s “most searing passages focuses on Osteen’s realization that he had long valued people based entirely on their intellectual achievements. How then, should he value his own son, who at 21 years old now, cannot read, perform simple math, or speak more than a few words?”
In his book, Osteen said he was forced to wonder what “intellectual capacity really means.”
” Does it make you better, more human? I realized that to accept Cameron fully, as a human, was to reassess my measuring stick. He is still valuable, still worthy of our love.”
A message released today by a Vatican official said the the church must find ways to support families with autistic children.
The message, in today’s CNS story, says the church’s efforts must be “directed toward ensuring that hope is not extinguished” in either persons with an autism disorder or in their family members, according to Archbishop Zygmunt Zimowski, president of the Pontifical Council for Health Care Ministry.
He also announced that his office’s annual international conference in November would be dedicated to autism-spectrum disorders and would bring together doctors, scientists, researchers, pastors, parents and volunteers to discuss practical ways to help people with autism and their families.
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Source: http://cnsblog.wordpress.com/2014/04/02/professor-reflects-on-autisms-impact/
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