A major storm was brewing on that early spring day as we drove across the prairies, hoping to make it home from a short family getaway before the billowing snow hit. But we all needed a break, and our accessible van needed gas, so when we came to a small town, we turned off the highway.

We contemplated finding a park in town for the kids to quickly stretch their legs, but the air that day was so cold and the sky so cloudy and dismal that no one thought that would be fun. Then, we saw it: an interesting-looking old bookstore with large, inviting windows and big wooden doors bedecked with shiny brass handles.  

Stepping inside, we found a cozy world of books upon books. A side wall that seemingly went on forever was lined with numerous kinds of board games for sale. At the front desk, you could buy a warm cup of tea or purchase a unique pottery teapot.  

We all win when everyone is welcome and included, including in delightful old bookstores.

Best of all, at the far end of the store was a little attached room with rows of tables alongside a jam-packed cupboard brimming with games in well-loved boxes. It was easy to envision friends coming here to play Cribbage or Yahtzee, steaming tea in hand, or to imagine shy strangers coming for an organized game meetup—and leaving having made a new buddy. 

In short, my family had stumbled upon the little town’s wonderful gathering spot. 

On one wall of this magnificent place was a sign that made me smile. “Everyone is welcome.  Be Inclusive!”, the sign proclaimed.

As a person with a disability and as a mother of kids and young adults with disabilities, inclusion is a core value to me. I see this as a key tenet of the Christian faith, of following Jesus’ call and sacrificial example to love our neighbour. 

We all win when everyone is welcome and included, including in delightful old bookstores.

But then, it hit me.  While the sign on the wall proclaimed inclusivity and welcome, this was in name only. Inequity and exclusion were the reality of this otherwise fantastic store.

You see, two large stairs lay before the bookstore’s beautiful wooden door. The kind that my power chair could never make it over. (My chair can surmount maybe a one-inch-high bump, but never stairs.  It also weighs hundreds of pounds, so cannot be carried up stairs by someone).

Those two stairs would have completely barred me and my wheelchair from entry, closing off my ability to experience the wonder of this town’s lovely meeting place.

Using my arm cane, I was able to get up those stairs and enter the store, only because I’d spent several years recovering mobility to the point that I am now a partial wheelchair user and a partial walker (often with a gait aide like my arm cane).

There were many years of my life when my mobility level was such that those two stairs would have completely barred me and my wheelchair from entry, closing off my ability to experience the wonder of this town’s lovely meeting place.

It makes me wonder, with sorrow, about the people living in this town who use wheelchairs. Do they ever roll down the street past the bookstore and glance longingly through the windows to where many of their friends and fellow townspeople are joyously gathering? Does the pain of the exclusion hurt—or are they used to it by now, accepting that others will meet there for games, tea, and friendship in a way they cannot? 

I know the pendulum of both of those emotional reactions well. Sometimes, in the face of inequity that leads to my or my kids’ exclusion, I feel a deep, aching, hurtful longing. Other times, I simply feel a numb acceptance that some doors will be closed to me in an inequitable, unfair world.  Sometimes—especially when the exclusion pertains to one of my kids—I wobble in the middle of the pendulum and simply feel angry.

It inspires and drives me to aim to do what I can within my life’s tiny sphere of influence to stand for true inclusion. Not the kind of false inclusion proclaimed on a sign inside a bookstore that has stairs to enter, but the type of true inclusion that builds ramps and throws open doors. When this happens, diversity follows—and we are all better for it. 

It’s the example the Bible describes of how Jesus lived his life on earth. He calls us to love our neighbours as ourselves (Matthew 22:39), and we only need to consider the Easter story to see how, in his sacrificial death and resurrection, he did just that.

In Luke 11, he had strong words for those who did not follow this commandment of neighbourly love. “Woe to you Pharisees, because you give God a tenth of your mint, rue and all other kinds of garden herbs, but you neglect justice and the love of God. You should have practiced the latter without leaving the former undone” (verse 42). And “….you load people down with burdens they can hardly carry, and you yourselves will not lift one finger to help them” (verse 46).

The challenge before us, in a world of metaphorical stairs, is to fight for genuine Christian love through inclusion, equity, and the welcome of all—not just in word but in deed. 

Photo by Pixabay