Published by Eerdmans on August 18, 2026
Genres: Academic, Disability Theology, Non-Fiction, Leadership
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Disabled youth want to offer ministry, not just receive it.
Cripping Youth Ministry breaks new ground by showcasing the ministry and leadership of disabled youth. Organized around a powerful theological framework of lament, protest, praise, and prophecy, this book challenges churches and theological institutions to repent of ableism and embrace the transformative ministry disabled youth are already doing.
Through original prayers, youth perspectives, and practical exercises, readers encounter how disabled youth navigate faith, resist injustice, and proclaim the gospel in revolutionary ways. Each chapter addresses contemporary issues intersecting with disability: mental health, sexuality, race and ethnicity, neurodiversity, and more. Discussion questions and resource lists make this volume immediately useful for congregational leaders and seminary classrooms alike.
Cripping Youth Ministry goes beyond advocating for inclusion; it shows how disabled youth are creating new vocabularies, ministries, and ways of carrying the gospel forward. In these pages, readers will see disabled youth leadership in action―and learn why it matters for the church.
When I was fresh out of seminary, I served as a youth pastor at a church. The “youth room” was a medium-sized space on the second floor overlooking the church’s gymnasium. Every Friday night and Sunday morning, I’d trudge up the steps and teach a couple dozen high school students about Jesus then walk down those same steps to leave. And—something that now shames me—I don’t know that I ever thought about the fact those steps were the only way to that room.
And if I had, at the time, I probably would have dismissed it as something I didn’t need to worry about because there was nobody in our youth group that couldn’t climb a set of stairs. I’d like to think that, had that situation changed, we would have found a solution. We would have realized that inaccessibility in church isn’t exactly inaccessibility to God but it is inaccessibility to God’s community. And no one deserves to be cut off or made less than in God’s community.
That last sentence is the central premise of Cripping Youth Ministry: An Intersectional Vision for Working with Disabled Youth. In the introduction, editor Justin Forbes writes that “Youth ministry has long been shaped by certain assumptions centered those who are extroverted, able-bodied, neurotypical, and emotionally self-regulating.” This book is an effort to undo those assumptions and learn from disabled youth what they need in order to feel included in God’s particular kin-dom community of church.
One of the most incredible things about this book is that it isn’t an academic field guide, but a collection of voices expressing their lived experience. Working with disabled youth isn’t only about making doorways wide enough for wheelchairs, offering sensory or quiet rooms, or training leadership in understanding physical, mental, and social disabilities. It’s about inviting them into the conversation to guide and direct it. This book is full of a diverse collection of people offering their wisdom based on their experiences.
Mosted edited books are “scholarly,” meaning that an academic collects chapters written by other academics and edits them into an organized compendium. Cripping Youth Ministry does have that academic organization—Drs. Justin Forbes and Erin Raffety lead the way—but the chapters are written by a diverse group of folks from high school students to PhDs. There are pastors and students. There are queer and trans writers. There’s an array of minority voices. Men and women. It’s a truly multi-faceted book with the editors doing a wonderful job directing the composition and making it sing in harmony.
To really do this book justice, I would need to write reviews of every chapter. So many things stand out. Forbes and Raffety divide the book into four liturgical movements: lament, protest, praise, and prophecy. I love everything about it. It acknowledges that disabled folks have often been overlooked in ministry. It highlights the injustice and the fight for inclusion and equality. It outlines practical ways churches can do that. But it also extols the value disabled folk already bring to church. It showcases what they can do and where they can lead.
This is not a book about solving a problem, it’s book about how to love, understand, minister to, and lead with those with disabilities. It is a blueprint for how we can reform the society within our churches to ease the burden and make church an easy and welcoming community. Cripping Youth Ministry is a prophetic voice exposing the latent and blatant ableism of the church that also reveals a new and better way forward.
Contributors:
Avery Arden, Carmelle Beaugelin Caldwell, Erik W. Carter, Michael Paul Cartledge, Morrigan Clarke, Letiah Fraser, Zach Grant, Lamar Hardwick, Samantha Houser, Deborah Huggins, Amy Jacober, Chris Larocque, Sarah Griffith Lund, Pepa Paniagua, Riley Pickett, Rudolph P. Reyes II, Cody J. Sanders, Andrew Scales, Len Scales, Hunter Steinitz, Joshua Taylor, Avery Williams