Holy Ground: Disabled Voices, Sacred Stories is an evening shaped by disabled lives, artistry, and spiritual wisdom. Centering voices all too often excluded and unconsidered in faith spaces, this gathering lifts these experiences as sacred testimony—revealing new ways of understanding God, community, and grace. Honoring The Gospel Project’s conviction that community is formed first at the table through presence, conversation, and belonging, the night begins with a shared meal at 5:30pm. Followed by this at 7:00pm, the evening invites the Church to worship experience, featuring theatrical storytelling, music and dance, and sacred testimony, —to ask not how disability should be overcome, but what the truth of our differentiated embodiment reveals in fact about what we share—about God, dignity, and vitality.

We are honored to welcome the return of the Peppermint Ridge Choir, whose music reflects joy, dignity, and deep community, embodying what it looks like when belonging is practiced and every voice is invited to participate fully. The evening will also feature Rev. Erin Beardemphl, whose pastoral and theological work alongside the Peppermint Ridge community invites the Church to listen more carefully to disabled experience as a source of spiritual truth and theological insight.

We are also honored to welcome Straight Up Abilities, an inclusive performing arts organization where artists of all abilities learn, create, and perform together. Through dance, theater, and expressive movement, their work centers access, dignity, and joy, reminding us that creativity is a shared language and that the Spirit moves most freely when every body is invited into the dance.

 Our keynote speaker, joining us from St. Louis, is Rev. Barbara “Bobbie” Blunt, an itinerant elder in the African Methodist Episcopal Church and Pastor of Buren Chapel A.M.E. Church in Herculaneum, Missouri. A seasoned pastor, chaplain, and community healer, her ministry bridges pulpit, hospital, and street-level outreach, grounded in embodied care, justice, and the sacred worth of every person.

 We are also honored to welcome Marleena Barber, a vocalist, cabaret artist, educator, and disability advocate whose work is shaped by lived experience. Her artistry offers audiences a powerful encounter with creativity, presence, and the sacred textures of disabled life.

 Joining the lineup is Helena Donato-Sapp, a young artist, poet, and disability justice advocate whose work centers intersectionality, embodiment, and belonging. Through her creative voice and public witness, Helena challenges ableism and invites communities to listen more deeply to disabled wisdom.

 Through music, testimony, scripture, and theatrical storytelling, the night explores how God is revealed through bodies and minds that move through the world differently. Rather than asking how disability can be cured or overcome, this gathering asks what disabled life reveals about God, belonging, and grace.

 This evening affirms a simple truth: every embodied life speaks of God. Difference becomes a teacher without being demanded. Access becomes a spiritual practice rather than an afterthought. Community becomes the place where all are seen, heard, and welcomed at the table.

 This gathering is planned with accessibility and multiple ways of participation in mind. ASL interpreters and childcare will be available.

Planned with accessibility and multiple ways of participation in mind, the evening includes ASL interpretation and childcare, affirming the hope of access as a spiritual practice through which God speaks like any other.