The compassion of 15-year-old Chad House permeated Nebraska Conference Annual Celebration 2005.

Chad, the son of Terry and Trudy House lives with behavioral, developmental and neurological disorders resulting from Fetal Alcohol Syndrome (FAS). His mom, Trudy, understands through and through that he is one of “God’s children `loaned’ to [her] to love, to nurture, and to teach.” First Congregational, UCC, Hastings, folk have long-since set aside discomfort to accept his special needs.

Karen Roback, Chad’s minister-person, said, “I have learned much more from him than he will ever learn from me.” After nurturing Chad’s early religious journey, she designed for him a confirmation program. He responded with clarity that he knows at heart level what God’s love and God’s church are about.

Chad also showed us that he lives his confirmation promises. He and Trudy stood near the “Speak Out” microphone as I described the mission of the doll I was about to loan him for a companion. A colleague at General Synod had invited me to check out the cloth doll riding in her wheelchair. This was no usual doll. The fingers sewn into each hand pad were made for holding. To be sure, it had rug yarn hair and a soft body. He wore a beard, but no mouth. For a frustrated youngster, a smile would offer little understanding. A sad mouth could not celebrate joy. Further, his eyes were as openly compassionate as those of a dog guide.

Chad listened to the stories about the doll who served as listener during the sleepless nights of a woman moving through chemotherapy. He spent time with a high school senior sidelined by mono and with another during a difficult season of bipolar disorder. He lived in the arms of an older man with Alzheimer’s and awoke a woman’s smile at the care center. He snuggled with another young child in another worship service. I, too, having wrapped my arms around this soft symbol of God’s presence, understood what they discovered.

So did Chad. As I wondered about his imaginative spiritual play, tender stories bubbled back to the Disabilities Ministries table. This youngster who finds relating to others difficult studied the faces of conference participants. From time to time he would approach someone. “Do you need to hold the Jesus Doll for a little while?” Then he placed him into their arms. From time to time others found in him a tool for chatting with Chad.

At the banquet, Chad approached the head table. He told our conference minister, “Jesus needs to sit at this table because that is where Jesus belongs.” So Roddy Dunkerson, our conference minister, found a chair, and the doll that reminds us of Whose we are and how we are to be with each other dined at the head table.

To learn about FAS, visit www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/fas/default.htm Beulah Enterprises, a Children’s Mission ministry of St. Paul & St. James Church in New Haven, CT, markets the Jesus Doll made in a cottage industry by battered women rebuilding their lives. – db

Used with permission of the Chad and his parent as well as with the blessing of the Nebraska Conference. Reading the Signs is edited by Dee Brauninger.