COMPASSION 212 Summer 2022

Summer 2022 - Compassion | www.tcf.org.uk 9 Book Reviews Michael: A Transforming Presence by Maureen Lahiff Michael Lahiff was born with Down’s Syndrome and died all too young at the age of 39. His younger brother and only sibling, David, had died of epilepsy seventeen years earlier . These are the stark facts which lie behind this short book which focuses not so much on heart-breaking circumstances but on the remarkable and wonderful impact that Michael’s life had on so many people. Maureen, who died recently, writes with great honesty about her life with her husband and two sons. She is not afraid to speak of the many difficulties, struggles and painful experiences that were hers. However she came to see the value of Michael’s life more and more and writes how he ‘taught me so much about joy, delight and authentic interiority’. The book gives numerous examples of how Michael’s life changed the lives of others for the better. He was for some years a member of a L’Arche Community in Sussex and its leader at the time contributes several pages of memories of him. His Christian faith was clearly a most important part of his life and Maureen writes about this and also about her own spiritual journey. It is from this perspective that she has a chapter on ‘Disability, Scripture and Church’ and another on ‘Ethics and Disability’. She recognises that decisions about the possibility of abortion when Down’s Syndrome is detected during pregnancy are by no means easy. Maureen Lahiff led a astonishingly full life and her book was written out of the wisdom of years and her deep reflections about Michael’s life and her own. Her readers have much to ponder, not least the matter of how we human beings respond to others who are different and disturbing to us. Henry Whyte