My church friend has become disabled: What do I do?

Disability affects 12 per cent of children, 25 per cent of working-age adults, and 45 per cent of people over State Pension age.

Many people in these figures will have been born with a disability, but the greater proportion of those with a disability have become disabled, due to either illness, a sudden medical event or an accident.

Reactions

People starting their journey of disability often face a lot of difficult things in their churches. Many of these are due to other people’s compassion and desire to make things better, others are due to a person’s need to “just say something”, even if it’s the wrong thing, and also the exact opposite—not knowing what to say, and so avoiding the newly disabled person.