Rev Tony Shearan, who has recently retired as a SSM priest in Hackney, reflects on his years of ministry and how sight loss has been at the centre of his calling to be a priest.
What is RP?
Several years ago I started to learn Braille. My teacher at the time was a young 20 year old who told me that she became blind as a result of an accident at school. I am blind because I have an inherited, incurable condition known as Retinitis Pigmentosa (RP). I mention this because for me, from the moment I was born, and in the absence of a cure in the intervening years, I knew I would become blind. It was inevitable and nothing could be done about it. The distinction may not be relevant to others with disabilities, but it is for me. It has helped me process, adjust to and eventually come to the place where I am. A place of acceptance, sometimes grumbling acceptance, of my blindness, without the nagging feeling of what would have happened if only I hadn’t done that thing…
RP is a degenerative condition and up to the age of around 30 I had no idea about its presence in my body. By that time, I had already been to and not been ‘recommended’ at a Bishop’s Selection Conference. Years later, and now with a blind registration, I was encouraged to attend another Conference. This time I was recommended for training. So I feel that an element of my ‘calling’ was as a ‘blind’ priest and that has been an important element of my work in the church to date.
Roller Coaster
Of course it has not all been plain sailing. I have profoundly struggled, been angry, cried a lot and walked away. Away from God or the church. I’m not sure what it is, but something makes me return. Somehow I just can’t walk away. During my ‘successful’ Selection conference I remember that one of the interviewers cried when I related a story of how I had struggled to make sense of it all. I have cried many times myself before and since.
You Don’t Look Blind!
As a blind person I feel I experience some of the goods and bads in people. The bads can be from those who bump into me. I can’t see them – and they hurl abuse at me. A few years ago I bumped into one chap who was standing outside a pub. I apologised and explained I was blind. He replied angrily, ‘You don’t look (expletive) blind!’ To which I replied, rather unwisely I now consider,’ ‘well you don’t look stupid.’ I walked away as quickly as I could before he realised it wasn’t meant to be a complement!
I find the goods though in the vast majority of people who are incredibly helpful. From those who see me waiting to cross the road with my white stick, and go out of their way to assist, to those who help me find the building I am heading to and shout out, ‘go right mate, there’s a bike in front of you!’ There are many many more examples of the kindness people have shown to me, far too many to mention.
I’ve been praying that you Might be Healed! Really?
I have encountered people (often very senior people in the church) who demonstrate a complete lack of understanding about blindness. From imitating blindness to try and illustrate a point in a sermon, to coming up to me and saying to me that ‘they have been praying for me – that you might be healed like Blind Bartimaeus.’ (Mark 10:46-52). For someone living and struggling with a profound disability this is incredibly insensitive, even now after many years, it still makes me angry. The reality is that I feel I have been healed. Not healed in the sense of the removal of the external factors of blindness, but rather a wider sense of healing. One that involved living with the condition and ‘accepting’ it, for want of a better word.
Accepting help
I’m passionately independent but I’ve learnt to accept help along the way – without which carrying out ministry would have been more difficult and more stressful. This is not a place to record names, (you know who you are) but rather to acknowledge that I, and I suspect many of us, rely on others to help us and enable us to carry out our work. But I still don’t find asking for help easy. It’s a paradox but I think it is the compromise I have made to enable me to live with more independence.
Being a Blind Priest
It took me over 25 years to respond to the sense of ‘calling’ to some form of ordained ministry. A long time and in many ways a difficult time as I tried to avoid the whole thing. A question I have repeatedly asked myself, without coming to any sort of conclusion, is Why? So I responded to the call – so what for? What was that about? In truth, I don’t know why. However, as I mentioned above, it seems to have something to do with disability. People have spoken to me about the sense of vulnerability that comes from my blindness – and how that can be a powerful sense, in that it may empower others. Others have talked of how my blindness is disarming and enables people to talk about their own issues freely, or perhaps more freely than when talking to others who do not have a recognisable disability.
I spent some time in Japan, and once did an MA in Japanese Religion. During the course of my studies I briefly looked at attitudes to blindness in both the Christian and Buddhist traditions. From my research, I found that attitudes to blindness somewhat differed between Western Christianity and Japanese Buddhism. I guess many reading this will be familiar with how blindness is often viewed in the New Testament, particularly the Gospels where restoration of sight is seen as the way to fulfilment. By contrast In Japanese Buddhism, those who are blind are often seen as having an additional level of insight. I struggle too with the way that blindness is referenced in some of the hymns we sing: ‘I once was lost, but now I’m found, was blind but now I see!’; ‘Just as I am, poor wretched blind.’ I hear what some may say about these references being context driven and illustrations. But I answer: ‘well I still find them offensive and if you were blind, perhaps you might too!’ Maybe we too should learn something from our friends in Japanese Buddhism about how we think about blindness!
My sight has now reached a stage where I cannot read print at all and rely on technology to assist me. In the early days, before the current technology was available, I used to memorise huge chunks of the liturgy including pretty much all of the Eucharistic prayers, including the appropriate seasonal variations. For sermons I would carry memory joggers with me that reminded me of the various points I was going to make. Thankfully I now no longer have to do this, relying instead on a small hand held device from where I can run the whole service without having to memorise a single word.
I think my sense of humour has helped too as I’ve journeyed along. And just as well too in certain circumstances. Like when my guide dog ate all the Communion bread and on a separate occasion vomited in front of the altar at a well-attended Midnight Mass!
I can only speak for Myself
I remember that at one conference I attended on Disability in the Workplace, one speaker said, ‘If you ask one person for their thoughts on disability, that’s what you’ll get, just one person’s thoughts.’ So these are just my reflections. I am certainly not trying to represent the views of any others who are blind or partially sighted, but if you have any questions or feedback on anything you have read here, please feel free to contact me via john.beauchamp@london.anglican.org