| Submitted to Program Units |
|---|
| 1: Childhood Studies and Religion Unit |
This book panel engages the recent text After the Worst Day Ever: What Sick Kids Know About Sustaining Hope in Chronic Illness, offering opportunities to re-imagine hope, eschatology, chronic illness, and healthcare from the perspectives of children. The book's guiding question asks, "What do sick children know about hope that the rest of us have forgotten?"
Illustrating how children articulate hope amid chronic illness, a distinct type of trauma and adversity, the book allows their voices to contribute to the constructive work of theologies of childhood. It offers readers an opportunity to engage and reimagine doctrine and practice from children's perspectives, in light of their lived realities. The children in the text shift hope from a future-oriented expectation of assurance from God to a lived experience of abundance in the moment--as much a social resource as a feeling, thought, or virtue.
Five scholars respond to the text, which identifies five practices that children with end-stage renal disease use to nurture hope: realizing community, claiming power, attending to Spirit, choosing trust, and maintaining identity.
Panelists name significant themes and questions raised by the book, including children's distinct intelligence; how illness disrupts stereotypes of children and development; the implications of hope research for life amid nonstop local and world crises; womanist perspectives on the spiritual life of children with disabilities; how chaplains and other healthcare professions follow and support a child's wisdom; how the book invites practitioners to reimagine end-of-life for sick children and their families; links between trauma theologies and theologies of childhood; how to collaborate with children to reshape theological assumptions without commodifying their spiritualities for adult purposes; what such collaboration means for adult-child relationships; and the types of assessments and interventions that should be used in pediatric chaplaincy and other settings to support the theology of hope articulated by children.
The session provides a forum for focused, interdisciplinary, and interreligious dialogue about the diverse relations of children and religion, equipping scholars to engage current questions of public policy and child advocacy related to trauma, healthcare, and hope among children.
Abstract for Online Program Book (maximum 150 words)
This book panel engages the recent text After the Worst Day Ever: What Sick Kids Know About Sustaining Hope in Chronic Illness, offering opportunities to re-imagine hope, eschatology, chronic illness, and healthcare from the perspectives of children. The book's guiding question asks, "What do sick children know about hope that the rest of us have forgotten?" Illustrating how children articulate hope amid chronic illness, a distinct type of trauma and adversity, the book allows their voices to contribute to the constructive work of theologies of childhood. It offers readers an opportunity to engage and reimagine doctrine and practice from children's perspectives, in light of their lived realities. The children in the text shift hope from a future-oriented expectation of assurance from God to a lived experience of abundance in the moment--as much a social resource as a feeling, thought, or virtue. Five scholars respond to the text, which identifies five practices that children with end-stage renal disease use to nurture hope: realizing community, claiming power, attending to Spirit, choosing trust, and maintaining identity. Panelists discuss significant themes and questions raised by the book.