, accessed in the upper left hand corner of this web resource, provides a guide to sources of information in alternative formats (braille, recorded cassettes, large print, e-texts, web audio) accessible by people with print disabilities--those with visual and physical handicaps as well as dyslexia. It is also a guide to information about blindness, visual handicaps and other physical handicaps, with a special collection of Wisconsin resources. There are about 2,300 individual links, all evaluated, annotated and organized by subject. This web resource offers a list of national organizations that offer services or information to blind and visually impaired people in the United States. They include government agencies, private social service agencies and many other organizations of and for blind and visually impaired people. Visit at .

What are some of your experiences, insights, growings from relating to ageism and/or changes and needs relating to accessibility? What are some of the innovative changes that have been made at your church to improve inclusion? What about the invisible disabilities of aging? Please submit a 150-400 word article for possible posting or add a comment in the comment box at the conclusion of any article on the web site.

A Reading the Signs column I no longer recall which came first, the fall on an icy sidewalk that necessitated a lesson for Treasure in how to dog guide a walker-using partner or the timely Christmas letter from Rachel Scott. My friend of years is a retired nurse/instructor in gerontology who has mastered the graceful art of using a wheelchair. She included the following "dashed off" list of guidelines for adding a little grace to our own welcoming of persons with wheelchairs into our churches and at home or care center visits. True to the manner in which Rachel approaches all people, each "Commandment" says, "See the person first." 1. You shall always respect the dignity and individuality of the person in a wheelchair as you do your own. 2. You shall remember that control over one's own life is very precious, so that you will not do for wheelchair users what they can do for themselves, even if it takes them longer. 3. You shall take care not to bump wheelchair wheels, remembering that a small bump to you may feel like a small earthquake to the person in the wheelchair. 4. You shall remember that unexpected movements of a wheelchair can be quite startling, so that you will always ask the user's permission before moving a wheelchair. 5. You shall remember that the person in a wheelchair may find it hard to look behind, so you will come around within the person's visual range before speaking or touching them. 6. You shall not assume that the person using a wheelchair is also hard of hearing, and shall speak in a normal volume. 7. You shall assume till you discover otherwise, that a person in a wheelchair has interests as broad as anyone else's, and shall converse accordingly, including not talking with others over the wheelchair user's head. 8. You shall be aware that conversing at the same level as the person using a wheelchair, by sitting or kneeling for all but brief exchanges, is more comfortable for the wheelchair user, and will be much appreciated. 9. You shall ask the user's preference before wheeling a wheelchair backwards. 10. You shall take care to place objects within easy reach, as a person using a wheelchair may not be able to reach as far as you. As you practice these commandments, your wheelchair-using friends will call you blessed! Thanks, Rachel. Used with the permission of the Nebraska Conference UCC

The Rev. Dr. Dosia Carlson, a member of the wider United Church of Christ Disabilities Ministries community and a recipient of the United Church of Christ Antoinette Brown Award for excellence and pioneering in ministry, contracted polio the day she was to have entered high school. To read the story of her spiritual and career journey go to www.ucc.org/women/finding.html

Finding us in the daily struggle, Dr. Carlson's music draws us forward with courage but never lets us diminish commitment. When I was about to retire from the Church of the Beatitudes staff, a colleague said, "Dosia, you've left your mark on this church." Now, that could be a compliment, but he was laughingly pointing out the gouges on my office door left by my electric scooter. During 30 years there, I wore out many electric wheelchair and scooter batteries. Considering battery and maintenance costs, it is surprising to talk about "free wheeling." Actually, my years in the ministry have been priceless. The daughter of Alexander Carlson, a Congregational minister, I grew up sensing that the church was my second home. I vowed early to be a missionary to China. However, the day before beginning high school, I entered the County Hospital in Toledo. Polio would alter my life, but I could still serve God. As early as fourth grade, I wrote songs that expressed my faith. Now in my 70's, creating hymns still helps me witness to God's presence. During high school days, I penned a revised life goal: Our Lord said "Go into every nation And tell my story to each race, Relieve the suffering of all people; Proclaim God's mercy, peace and grace. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . As others go into every nation So may I follow in my mind. Through earnest prayer and heartfelt giving, I too may go and serve mankind. And so I followed to Oberlin College and other university settings. One academic dean, realizing that wheelchair mobility might limit career options, wanted to discourage me from becoming a teacher. I was determined to start professional life as a classroom teacher. I became THE teacher in a one-room high school class for students with orthopedic disabilities. I loved teaching yet felt drawn to full-time Christian ministry. Years at Hartford Seminary were challenging not only in terms of mind and soul-stretching classes, but also in terms of physical barriers. Stairs everywhere meant I needed students with strong arms to carry me from one floor to another. New England snowstorms motivated one student to mount a chair on a sled so friends could pull me through the drifts. After seminary I shared my next fourteen years on the faculty at Defiance College in Ohio. Teaching in the Religion Department and coordinating co-curricular activities helped keep me fully alive. Some hymns emerging during that era reflect varying moods. A quotation from St. Augustine inspired these words: "A Christian should be an alleluia . . . from head to foot! / Every cell of every muscle in this body I call "me" / Sings aloud in jubilation praising God unendingly." We used maracas and tambourines to punctuate the calypso rhythm. By contrast, a more reflective yet vigorous hymn included this verse: "Renew us, 0 God, when we lose our compassion, / Rekindle a smoldering conscience of care; / Surrounded by self our existence is bare; / Renew us, 0 God, by your spirit of love." After moving to Phoenix in 1974, my hymn writing accelerated. I find a healing focus in many hymn texts, particularly those written during my time of involvement in the parish nurse movement and the founding of the first hospice in Phoenix. When worried that a malignancy had returned to my leg, I rejoiced in news of a benign biopsy, even naming a hymn tune, BENIGN: "Worry and fear we have fostered too long. / Spirits were weak when they should have been strong. / Now let us move from a sigh to a song. / Gloria, thanks be to God." Sometimes a simple phrase spawns a hymn. While helping with a conference in California, I dragged too much stuff along. Suddenly, words popped into my head: "Lighten my load, Lord, I want to lighten my load." Working with aging persons and their care givers has dominated my Phoenix ministry. When leading workshops or retreats dealing with aging and spirituality, I create new hymns. This refrain is for a hymn based on Psalm 92: "Still bearing fruit, morning after morning; / Still bearing fruit, year after year. / Faithful to God our creator, sustainer, / Thankful to God for planting us here." I remain thankful to God for planting me here and for providing opportunities to celebrate wholeness. A recently installed sanctuary chancel ramp is surely a cause for celebration. As my freewheeling retirement years enable me to volunteer in stimulating ways, I pray that I can leave my mark through witnessing and not just by scraping doors with my wheelchair. No matter what happens, I know that "a Christian can always be an Alleluia!" From UCC DM Newsletter Archive

From time to time, someone from one of our churches will ask a member of the Nebraska Conference Disabilities Ministries Committee if we have material about designing or renovating a home for an older individual or for anyone with a disability. In earlier columns we have spoken about the principles of universal design. Universal design is the design of products and environments to be usable by all people, to the greatest extent possible, without the need for adaptation or specialized design. Recently, Jo Clare Hartsig, Co-Chair of the UCC Disabilities Ministries Committee, sent a news release from the architect Charles Schwab, AIA. In his book, Universal Designed "SMART" Homes for the Twenty First Century, the architect, Charles Schwab, presents plans for 83 unique, completely accessible stock homes. Home construction blueprints and stock home plan revisions can be ordered as well as arrangements made for custom architectural services. Interviewing and listening to the needs of persons with disabilities led to several innovative features that had not been addressed earlier by universal designers. One of Schwab's unique features is clean indoor air. Several people also requested a safe room: a place of refuge in the case of natural or human-made disaster. As a result, Schwab designed a universal design bathroom that would also serve as a safe room accessible to a person using a wheelchair or anyone with limited mobility. Excerpts of the press release read: "This is the first Stock home plans book that combines Universal Design, Energy efficiency and Green building practices as well as optional SafeRoomsâ„¢ in every home plan. Thirty of the home plans are less than 2000 square feet and are affordably designed in the New Urbanism style for narrow lots for urban infill as well as retirement housing communities. We specify sustainable and low maintenance materials. The remaining homes are mostly less than 4000 square feet. Home types include in-law additions, empty nester, single family and duplexes. "The plan book also has an informative room-byroom description of features and benefits in the UD Smart home. This is a checklist and is included in an effort to be of use to advocates, agencies, builders and homeowners alike. This resource will be of use for those making home modifications and Universal designed home additions." Many of Schwab's ideas, based on the seven principles of universal design, can be used in church buildings as well as homes and businesses. The web site, www.universaldesignon-line.com contains sample designs. For additional information about the book of plans, contact Schwab by phone at 563-359-7524 or through email:charless-chwab@universaldesignon-line.com. Reading the Signs...A Can-Do Forum about accessibility for the whole church family, Dee Brauninger, Editor. Nebraska Conference

"(Make) supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings for everyone... so that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all goodness and dignity" (1 Tim. 2:1-2). Vulnerability pricks when one we know has Alzheimer's Disease. We shy at first hint of a fragile brain. Unnerved, we quake at our mental lapses. We cannot predict another's. What worked in last Sunday's conversation may not today. To keep a church a welcoming place, members sustain personal dignity by finding active, comforting ways to relate to those enduring AZ. When the Rev. Carl Kemper could attend United Church of Christ, First Congregational in Crete, he appreciated greetings from many even without knowing names. Some invited Carl to sit with them so Betty could play bells and sing in choir. In early stages, chatting without pressuring question or expectation, as if he understood fully, offered Carl a message of respect. AZ is about our remembering who a person was and whose he is. AZ is about our forgetting what is right with him. Become his memory. Replay his life's relevance. Focus on what he can do and enjoy. Keep talk simple. Introduce yourself, telling your relationship. Use name tags. Say "Tell me more" during memory talk. Ask yes/no questions. Give time to answer. Talk about real things. Using the same words, repeat sentences when necessary. Gently distract during frustration. Avoid correcting, arguing, or attempting to reason. Provide appropriate touch. Then embrace the curious relief you feel when your friend releases you by no longer knowing you. Surprisingly, this also frees us for a new relationship. Talk becomes a unique setting aside of ourselves to engage in a new listening and joining in whatever is the focus of the moment. In this living moment, tone of voice communicates. During these visits that require greatness of spirit, we accept another without reservation. We hope that somehow he knows we acknowledge the inner nature, which no disease can destroy. Writing for the Disabilities Ministries Traveling Exhibit about their AZ journey, Betty Kemper drew us closer to appreciating spousal grief. "Like an onion, one layer of memory at a time peels away. I have lost a companion, lover, and helpmate of 55 years." With the pace of Carl's AZ accelerating, Betty teaches us further about partner support. "The silence (of others) is the hardest thing - worse than a physical death. People know how to act then. They bring casseroles and love," she said. Ask spouses how things are. As word spread that Carl had moved into the AZ unit, Betty welcomed letters from friends in previous churches. Let them know by note or phone call that they remain on your prayer list. Showing concern "I'm sorry this has happened" or "I'm praying for you and your mate" helps throughout the chaos. With AZ, we have little access to someone's "inner nature (that) is being renewed day by day" (2 Corinthians 4:16). With her husband unable to attend a class reunion, Betty asked what his prayer would be for his classmates. From somewhere inside him, Carl answered, "To trust in God so they can face the difficult times in life." - db (For additional information about AZ, see www.mayohealth.org.) This Reading the Signs column is published with the permission of Betty Kemper and with the blessing of the Nebraska Conference.

You open your church's front door and enter without a thought. If advancing years or a temporary, progressive, or permanent disability has diminished your strength, you may still open the door enough for a foot or shoulder wedge. Then, thrusting your body against the door, you are in. That is, if you could grasp the handle while managing a walker or cane. Or, you pound on the door and wait because you are a child or your wheelchair reach does not afford the leverage necessary to budge the door. For some, the door gets heavier each year. Overnight, a church door can become a wall. While we are not under American Disabilities Act requirements, churches do set a community example by opening our own doors. Jeanne Walter, Disability Rights and ADA Specialist at Lincoln's League of Human Dignity, said that ADA guidelines relate to door width and steps but say nothing about weight. Neither do they currently require automatic doors. In addition to advocacy work, the League administers Barrier Removal and Information Centers (BRICs). BRIC's consultation services include on-site assessments, recommendations on the most cost-effective and best solutions, and implementation plans. Phone 1-800-742-7338 V/TDD. Courage in the struggle for justice and for peace comes to people one by one. A person's tenacity in continuing to move forward does spring from small, quiet, surprising offerings by perceptive individuals and willing church committees. By thinking universally and responding with compassion, churches do eliminate attitudinal and architectural barriers. The architectural principle of universal design involves designing all products, buildings, and exterior space to be usable by all people to the greatest extent possible. Follo Society-and-Culture, Disabilities, at Universal Design Internet links . UCC churches have another way to participate with each other in building projects. Cornerstone Fund provides low-cost loans for money needed to improve accessibility, renovate or expand facilities, or to refinance existing real estate debt. Pooled investments from local churches and members enable Cornerstone Fund to pass by fees normally associated with similar loans. At www.ucc.org, visit Cornerstone Fund. Does your church employ anyone with disabilities? Trail the Assistive Technology Partnership (ATP) link on or phone 1-888-806-6287. ATP provides statewide on-site technical assistance, latest innovations, and low-cost accessibility solutions for employers. Why not complete the year by taking a closer look at reshaping your church and camping facilities so that all will be welcome regardless of one's physical capacities? Rather than being places of gradual exclusion, our churches may then continue to be builders of communion. - db Reading the Signs columns shared by Nebraska Conference are Can-do Forums about accessibility for the whole church family.