No wheelchairs in heaven? What about autism?

Yesterday morning on NPR's Morning Edition, I heard Ben Mattlin's commentary Valuing Life Whether Disabled or Not (available in either Windows Media or Real Player format).

Commentator Ben Mattlin has been quadriplegic since birth. At the memorial service for a disabled friend who passed away, he came to realize the world needs to expand its definition of what it means to live a successful life, disability or not.

What caught my attention, and inspired the first part of the title of this post, were the last few sentences of the commentary:

Are there no wheelchairs in heaven? I'm not buying it. For me, if there is a heaven, it's not a place where I'll be able to walk. It's a place where it doesn't matter if you can't.

If there is indeed a heaven, and our autistic children go there when they die, will they still be autistic?

tagged as: Autism, NPR, Morning Edition, Heaven, Disabilities