Moving Beyond Disability Access to Disability Justice

Quaker Meetings aspire to be welcoming, yet disabled Friends often encounter unintended barriers. This session invites you to reflect on how society – and our Meetings – often view disability, and how those perspectives can be limiting or harmful. Through the lens of disability justice, we will explore how access goes far beyond ramps and legal compliance, calling for deeper self-reflection and structural change.

This session will centre the voices of disabled Friends, including those with physical disabilities, neurodivergences, and mental health conditions, offering space to share their experiences of ableism. We will listen to these experiences, reflect on our own contexts, and work together towards creating meaningful change.

Using the principles of disability justice – including intersectionality and collective liberation – we’ll identify ways to foster access, including making it comfortable for Friends to express their access needs. Participants will leave with concrete strategies and resources to bring back to their Meetings, helping to create more radically welcoming and accessible Quaker spaces.

This three-hour live session will include a one-hour lunch break. It will be interactive, involving a presentation and small group work in breakout rooms. It is run in collaboration with Quaker Disability Equality Group (QDEG) and has input from the group Neurodivergent Friends. Whether you identify as disabled or not, you are warmly welcomed to participate. Ableism negatively impacts us all – whether we’re disabled or not – and a disability justice framework strives to create a more inclusive world for everyone. We would like you on this journey with us!

11:00 – 12:30 → First session (1.5 hours)
12:30 – 1:30 → Lunch break (1 hour)
1:30 – 3:00 → Second session (1.5 hours)