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Krysia and Ian reflect on the first year of the Autism & Theology podcast.
The transcript of the episode is available here: https://share.transistor.fm/s/dfd1305d/transcript.txt
The transcript of the episode is available here: https://share.transistor.fm/s/dfd1305d/transcript.txt
If you have any questions, or just want to say hi, email us at cat@abdn.ac.uk or find us on twitter @autismtheology.
This podcast is brought to you by The University of Aberdeen's Centre for Autism and Theology.
The artwork for this podcast uses the Centre for Autism and Theology Logo, created by Holly Russel
Creators and Guests
What is Autism and Theology Podcast?
The Autism and Theology Podcast is a space where we engage with the latest conversations in the field of autism and theology, share relevant resources, and promote ways in which both faith and non-faith communities can enable autistic people to flourish.
Our episodes are released on the first Wednesday of every month. We have a variety of guests who are related in some way to the field of autism and theology. Some are academics, others are people with life stories to share, and some are both!
We also release CATChat every third Wednesday of the month. These are shorter and more informal episodes where your hosts will share news and give you as listeners an opportunity to ask questions and share your stories.
Krysia Ian one year CATChat
Zoe: Welcome to the Autism and Theology podcast, brought to you by the Centre for Autism and Theology at the University of Aberdeen.
Krysia: Hello and welcome to this episode of the Autism and Theology podcast. I'm Krysia and it's great that you've joined us this week. This podcast is a space where we'll be, we will be engaging with the latest conversations in the field of autism and theology, sharing relevant resources and promoting ways that help faith and non faith communities enable autistic people to flourish.
Our podcast episodes are released on the first Wednesday of every month, and CAT Chat, like this episode, is released on every third Wednesday, where your hosts share news and answer your questions. This podcast is run from the University of Aberdeen's Centre for Autism and Theology, which we've shortened to CAT.
This week, Ian and I are reflecting on how the podcast has gone so far, because I can't believe we've actually been going nearly a year.
Ian: Yeah.
Krysia: A year when this comes out.
Ian: Right. It's, it's sort of wild to imagine that we've, that we've done a year's worth of episodes already.
Krysia: It really is. And the number of people that we've spoken to with so many different perspectives and knowledge to share as well.
And so many different ways we've done episodes as well. We've done episodes where people. They've been really informal and laid back and we've had episodes where people have had kind of structured topics they've wanted to talk about and we had the fantastic episode with Autism Consecrated where we completely rejigged how we did our podcasts and actually read the responses and engaged with the responses that were pre written.
Ian: Yeah, which was, you know, I, we reflected on that a bit already, I think, in a previous CAT chat episode, but it's just, it's, it's still fascinating in a way, in a way that, that, that we still have so much to learn, right? That, that for us, that was I don't want to, maybe uncomfortable is putting it too strongly, but maybe it's not, right?
We were a little nervous or anxious going into that. How is this going to play? How is this going to work? And, and I think it worked really, really well.
Krysia: Yeah, I think it did too.
Ian: I think all the feedback that we've received has been pretty overwhelmingly positive. And it just is, I, I just can't get over what a great illustration it is of how much resistance there often is to accommodation, right?
Krysia: Yeah.
Ian: And then how easy accommodation can turn out to be not that it always is right sometimes accommodation or supports are significant and I don't want to minimize that but but often it's much easier than we realize and and works out better than we than we anticipate that it will.
Krysia: Yeah, definitely. And I think when I was thinking just before we started recording the podcast, almost the many different ways we've just tried in the last year, kind of the three main different ways of just having an informal conversation with people are quite happy to have more conversational backwards and forwards, where people wanted to talk about particular parts of their research or their book and going to plan those in advance and reading kind of the reading out responses and responding to those sets a precedent for us to be more creative in the next year, I think, as well.
Ian: Sure.
Krysia: Because I guess part of what is so novel about the Autism and Theology podcast is not just the content that we're sharing, but the ways in how we're involving other people in that and other guests which I think is really important because so many podcasts, certainly some that I listen to, there's this real drive to be really conversational, really conversational, but actually, which is obviously great if you That, that, that's the way you work, that's the way you communicate easily with the least stress. And I think what's really good for forcing us as a team to do things differently, although we do, we like to think we have an inclusive outlook, it's really good to be challenged and kind of to do, to try things out. And I think that's really important.
And I think what's been so great for me over the last year is also the number of different people we've spoken to. We've spoken to researchers, social scientists we've spoken to autistic people who are doing things kind of practitionally on the ground as well, which I think that breadth as well is really important, not just speaking to people in paid positions doing certain types of research.
We want all kinds of knowledge. On our podcast.
Ian: Yeah. I, and I think that's what's exciting about this to me. What's exciting about this podcast and the work of CAT in general, not to sound like an advertisement for CAT, right? But that, but, but what's exciting to me is that these conversations really a lot of them are still in their infancy are, are still like, we're still making connections, we're still forming a community because it doesn't, it isn't as established a field. It isn't as, as longstanding a field as some other subdisciplines, academic subdisciplines, and so we're still able to, I think, I mean, I'm still learning from some of these episodes, right? Because I'm encountering new research and new perspectives that I haven't encountered before.
And this is my, I mean, it's like my PhD topic in it, you know, more generally speaking. So, like, I feel like I'm more plugged in than the average person. And yet I'm still learning a great deal just, just doing these episodes because there's so much out there. There's so much ground that hasn't been covered and people that are covering it sort of every day as we go along.
Krysia: Yeah, definitely. And I think even much like you, I always consider myself a little bit more plugged in than the average person or the average church goer. And there are certainly kind of little aspects that I know quite a lot about, but I won't necessarily know about what some people are doing on the ground somewhere or how someone had a thought process while they were writing a book or those kind of things that actually it's really important for to learn about and to share as well.
Ian: Yeah. And that's, I mean, one of the, one of the most rewarding and exciting things about doing this is the way that I have heard from people who are not quote unquote, plugged in, who are not part of the academic, the wider academic community necessarily, but who are interested in the intersection of autism and theology, who have autistic family members or, or autistic people in their churches and just want to learn more about it.
And I've heard from people who have said, I've learned so much just listening to this. And like that, there's nothing, there's, there's no greater compliment that you could give to me, at least, than, than that you learned from me, right?
Krysia: Yeah.
Ian: From something that I'm doing. So that's just, it's, it's just really cool to hear from people who might not otherwise have been exposed to some of this thought and some of this research and some of this thinking who have, who have gained something from it, right?
Krysia: Definitely. And I think certainly from my experience, some of the knowledge that's really important in what we do is really siloed. So it only sits in certain with certain groups of people and not necessarily be disseminated or kind of shared out more widely. And I think there's various reasons for that.
But I think something like this podcast is helping (A) start dialogue and conversations and break down some of the walls. I wouldn't say it's broken down all of them, but it's certainly got some really good conversation starters to help tackle some more things that, you know, we do need to look at things like this or that.
Or, we do need to think about who we talk to and who we kind of engage with and whose thoughts and, you know, those kind of things who we listen to as well, because I think it's very much from my experience, an awful lot is out that there is stuff out there, but not everybody knows about. everything.
Ian: Sure.
Krysia: Even if you've knocked around for a while, you may not necessarily know something perhaps in a different denomination that's going on or in a slightly different country. So it's really useful, I guess.
Ian: Yeah. And, and especially because I, we're still, I mean, I don't think I'm breaking any new ground here in saying we are still at a place where the average understanding of autism is, is probably out of date by 15 or 20 years, at least, right?
Krysia: I'd agree with that. Yeah.
Ian: Like that's not a, I don't mean that as a judgment, like it's certainly not ideal, obviously, but but a lot of people just are only exposed to what they're exposed to right?
Krysia: Yeah.
Ian: You can't you can't it's it's like how I never judge someone for pronouncing a word wrong because all that means is they've never heard someone say it, they've only read it in print and like, why is that why would you be ashamed of that? Right?
The same is true for for thinking about autism in the church the vast majority of people have really only had minimal exposure to that and so we have a lot of sort of prevailing counternarr-- or prevailing narratives that are not really accurate or not really universally applicable and so providing some ways of muddying those waters of giving people reason to think maybe it's not as simple as I've been led to believe or a straightforward, that, that this involves seeing people as human beings rather than as a category that we can treat all the same, right?
Like,
Krysia: Yeah
Ian: I think that's all really important stuff.
Krysia: Yeah, because autistic people have always been in churches, you know, as two autistic people, there's always been people like us in churches, but whether that's been necessarily recognized, not seen as someone who's a bit eccentric, or kind of likes to do things a certain way, or finds certain, you know, things difficult, or things of distress will be seen and understood, it wouldn't necessarily, I guess a lot of the knowledge and how people are understood within church spaces who are different isn't necessarily always in the most positive light, kind of historically anyway.
I think this is why we need these positive and humanising narratives that places like CAT, lots of other people who are working on various things with different churches and research groups and practitioners, that's why we need them to help spread that information more widely, effectively, so that people then have what you say that framework to help show a new way of thinking,
Ian: Changing gears a bit. And I I, I realize I'm doing something wrong by asking you a question out of the blue, but
Krysia: Go ahead
Ian: have you, do you, in thinking back on the past year, do you have a, like a favorite episode that you've been a part of or something, you know, an episode that sticks out in your memory?
Krysia: I think for me. I, so I did for listeners, I did in episodes with Leon on his book Autism & Worship. I did an episode with Precious Sango on her work with autistic people and people with learning disabilities and spiritual care. And an episode with Naomi Jacobs and Emily Richardson on their book At the Gates.
And I think talking about the book At the Gates was actually really good personally for me because. (A), it's a cracking book, but also because it's really important. So there's some really useful messages in there, which are more kind of for disabled people more generally, but actually it's really important that when we think about autistic people in church and autism and theology, that we talk to general disability theology and the public theology of disabled people more broadly as well. And I think bringing all those things together was for me really, really great. And also the fact it's a book that was written in partnership with one of Naomi's participants as a participatory project both as co authors, which was, you know, again, is a precedent.
I don't think many people always do within our field. So I think there's lots of different things around that episode about kind of what the book is, what the book was saying, and also the relevance to our community of thinkers, scholars, practitioners, people who work with and know autistic people, families of autistic people.
Autistic, obviously autistic people should be top of the list as well in that one. That's kind of going on my very, my list slightly all over the place. There's so much that you can kind of pick out and pull from that book, I think.
Ian: No, it's, it's, it's certainly a great book.
Krysia: Yeah. What's, what was your, what was your favorite episode for you to turn the question back on you?
Ian: Sure. And I'm realizing now that I've asked it, I don't, I would have a tough time naming one favorite. I think, for me the one that was most impactful on me was the Autism Consecrated episode for the reasons that we talked about, right, in realizing how much further I still have to go, right, in terms of being accommodating and exposing how hesitant I can even be.
So that was, that was, I think, turned out to be a really good episode regardless, but also just, just from a learning perspective, was really influential on me. I I had a lot of fun doing the most recent episode with Léon about autism and senses in worship just because I love talking about liturgy and he's a great person to talk about liturgy with.
But I also, I, I recently I was, this is embarrassing to admit, but I recently Googled myself because I was looking for something I had written, and I couldn't remember where it was placed on the Internet, and I Googled myself, and I came across several different places that had written or quoted some the episode that Harry and I did around the Imago Dei.
And things that I had said in there that, that, that had evidently resonated with people that I hadn't even realized, right? So I found these things on the internet where people had reflected on that episode or things that I'd said in that episode. And I just thought, wow, it's, I mean, it's kind of incredible because I, you know, when you're recording a podcast, it can feel like you're just shouting at an empty sky, right? You don't necessarily know who's listening. And you don't necessarily receive feedback from them and, and I'm not suggesting that we should necessarily or anything like that. But these were people in some cases, people that I don't even know who had reflected on this episode and things that I'd said.
And it was just, it was just this moment of realizing, wow, this actually is having an impact beyond what I, what I know. beyond what I'm aware of. And that was just, that's just an incredibly cool moment to realise what we're doing does matter, right?
Krysia: Definitely. I had a similar moment at a conference this week actually, where someone had cited me. It was so weird seeing my name on a PowerPoint screen.
It's just like, it's just unreal. Obviously that's just within academic circles. I'd argue that what you experienced is just so much more profound because everybody can access it in terms of there's no paywall and we have a transcript obviously there's so much more we can do in terms of access, but there just isn't that financial barrier to that knowledge that exists.
Ian: Which is, yeah, which is, I think, why we started this podcast and I think why it's been by my by my standards, at least it's been a wild success. I,
Krysia: I would echo that. I'd say any, any one person who listens to the three of us talk about things we're all so passionate about we're honoured that you're listening and that's fantastic because we're never quite sure how much of an episode, or how much of a response each episode is going to get.
Ian: Sure.
Krysia: Obviously when we set the schedule we we take suggestions from viewers, people who might want to come on, obviously from the Centre as well, and people we know who are practicing fantastic things, fantastic emergent thinkers, have done fantastic work, and try and cover a lot of those ground across the board, but obviously to hear that feedback. It's just fantastic.
Ian: Yeah. And I think this is, this is not reflecting on the past year, but I always, I never, I'm always reticent to just look at the past. I always want to look ahead too you know, in part because my memory isn't very good, right? Especially that type of episodic memory, I don't remember the past that well. So I always want to be thinking about the future cause I, I, I'm sometimes much more in tune to that and we, we have some really good episodes planned. I think we have some really exciting stuff on the horizon and I don't want to give all that away, especially because the schedule can be in flux when we're talking far out, but it's, there's some really, some really exciting stuff, I think.
Krysia: Definitely. Definitely.
Ian: One last thing I think I would say is just to encourage listeners, if you have thoughts about the podcast to reach out to give us if you know people who are involved in research, who are practitioners, if you think, if you know of people who would be good for us to talk to, if you have questions, if you have thoughts we would love to hear those.
I think I think it always benefits to have more people involved in the conversation. So if anyone, if anyone out there listening has any thoughts whatsoever, I just encourage you to share those with us.
Krysia: Definitely, even if it's a one line email or a one line message on social media, don't need to worry about all the kind of social niceties in a way.
Ian: Exactly.
Krysia: We are a fully neurodivergent team, you know, we, We, we get it. So definitely do reach out if you do have something to say or you'd like to suggest someone. We're very open to suggestions. In fact, we want them, if anything. So thank you everyone for joining Ian and I reflect on the last. year of the CAT podcast, Autism & Theology podcast.
If you have any questions, as we've just said, you can message us @autismtheology on X or Instagram, or you can send us an email at cat@abdn.ac.uk. Even if it's just to say hi, we'd love to hear from you. If you have any questions, do send them our way, and we look forward to you joining us for our next episode on the 2nd of October.
Zoe: Thank you for listening to the Autism and Theology podcast. If you have any questions for us or just want to say hi, feel free to Please email us at cat@abdn.ac.uk or find us on Twitter @autismtheology