July is Disability Pride Month.  It is strikingly noticeable that the month is not identified as an “awareness” month.  Rather, it is a month that expresses pride by celebrating the lives, achievements, and contributions of people with disabilities.  It is not a month for looking down upon people with disabilities; instead, it is a month set aside not to define people by their abilities, but to see the whole person with ability and a disability.

Disability Pride Month commemorates the signing of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) on July 26, 1990.  While this month seeks to raise everyone’s awareness of disability rights and confronts the challenges of living in a society with strict definitions of what it means to be acceptable, the month promotes accessibility to be a standard and not an afterthought.

To be sure, the extent to which disability is synonymous, or closely associated, with accessibility, Disability Pride Month needs to be a clarion call for advocating freedom and justice.  Whereas we are living in a time when diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility are being challenged as illegal and immoral—even thought by some to be unamerican—it is imperative that we not surrender more than three decades of working for justice to become dust in the wind.  While many are inclined to speak of persons with disabilities as having profound resilience, I want to suggest that we reorganize our thoughts to stress the importance of resistance at this present time . . . to resist being hoodwinked into supporting ideas that attending to accessibility gives a person with a disability an unfair advantage in American society. 

As we reflect on the work to advance as well as commemorate Disability Pride, I recall for us the work of Angela Molloy, Iliff JDP student, who coordinated a conference of the Institute on Theology and Disability that was hosted at Iliff School of Theology in June 2025.  The Institute gathered 130 people to learn together.  The Institute actualizes its Vision by gathering “leading scholars and writers in the areas of theology and disability with clergy, religious leaders, practitioners, laity and others who are interested and involved in inclusive ministries and faith supports” committed to working to make a new world.  Robert Monson, Iliff JDP student, was a plenary speaker during the conference.  Know that the Iliff School of Theology affirms and supports the diversity of our community as we advocate freedom and justice for all!

Sincerely,

Rev. Dr. Lee Butler, Jr.

President and CEO of Iliff School of Theology