McGuire Memorial Awakening Spiritual Dimensions

About the Book

McGuire Memorial Awakening Spiritual Dimensions: Catechesis and Prayer Services with Persons with Severe Disabilities offers a program and method whereby persons with severe intellectual and physical disabilities and their catechists are given the tools to awaken the Spirit of God within them and learn about the love of God for them. The book begins with the purpose and methods used in the program to allow its participants to evoke and awaken the love and presence of God during a time of catechesis and prayer. It is a sensory-based program of learning allowing the person with a disability to experience a sense of the sacred by way of sight, sounds, aroma, and symbols. The sessions are brief and composed of prayer, scripture, a lesson and a simple written activity.

About the Author

Fr. William Gillum, OFM Cap., M Div., M Ed. is a Capuchin Franciscan friar and priest of the Pittsburgh PA Province of St. Augustine. He received his M.Div. from the Washington Theological Union in 1976 and his M. Ed. in special education from Loyola University in Baltimore MD in 1985. He served as Director of Special Religious Education in the Diocese of Cleveland from 1986 until 1989. Fr. Bill served at McGuire Memorial in New Brighton, PA as Director of Spiritual Programs from 1995 until 2013. Presently he is serving in the Capuchin post-novitiate formation program at Capuchin College in Washington, DC.