I’ll never forget the Sunday morning I watched a woman in her seventies try to stand for the reading of the Gospel. Her hands gripped the pew in front of her, knuckles white with effort. She made it halfway up before her legs gave out, and she sank back down with a look I recognized immediately: shame.

Not because she couldn’t stand. But because the liturgy told her she should.

“Please stand for the reading of God’s Word.”

Five words that seem harmless. Traditional. Reverent, even. But here’s the thing: those five words contain an entire theology about whose bodies matter, whose worship counts, and who the church imagined when it designed its rituals.

And friends, it’s a theology problem.

The Body Position Hierarchy We Don’t Talk About

Let’s be honest about what happens in most church services. Standing is for important things: the Gospel reading, the benediction, the singing of hymns. Sitting is for listening, for receiving. Kneeling (in traditions that practice it) is for the most sacred moments of penitence or communion.

We’ve created a hierarchy of body positions that maps onto a hierarchy of sacred moments.

The problem? This hierarchy assumes everyone has the same relationship with their body. It assumes standing is always possible, always comfortable, and always the “more reverent” option.

I’m a person with a visual disability who also lives with chronic pain. Some Sundays, standing for every hymn means I’m depleted before the sermon even starts. Some Sundays, my body simply says no. And I’ve learned to listen to my body—it’s taken years of unlearning the toxic theology that taught me to override my physical needs for spiritual performance.

But I still feel it. That subtle message embedded in “please stand.” The implication is that full participation requires a certain kind of body. A body that works in predictable, normative ways.

What Our Liturgy Preaches

You know what’s wild? We spend hours crafting our sermons, carefully choosing words that include and invite. We update our statements of welcome. We put rainbow flags on our websites. We say we value radical inclusion.

And then we stand up every single Sunday and tell people with disabilities, chronic illness, chronic pain, fatigue, pregnancy complications, aging bodies, and countless other conditions that their bodies aren’t the ones we imagined when we planned worship.

Your liturgy is your lived theology. What you say and don’t say in those gathered moments teaches your congregation what you actually believe about God, bodies, belonging, and belovedness.

When we say “please stand” without offering an alternative framing, here’s what we’re preaching:

• Able bodies are the default bodies
• Physical posture determines spiritual engagement 
• Conformity matters more than accessibility
• Some bodies belong more than others

I don’t think most worship leaders mean to preach this sermon. But we preach it anyway. Every single week.

The “Just Stay Seated” Myth

Someone’s already thinking it: “But people can just stay seated if they need to!”

Sure. Technically. You’re right.

But let me tell you what that feels like from the pew.

When everyone around you stands and you remain seated, you become visible in your difference. You become the exception, the accommodation, the one who can’t. In a room full of standing bodies, your seated body becomes a statement you didn’t choose to make.

And before you tell me that’s just my insecurity talking, remember: we live in a culture that already tells people with disabilities that our bodies are wrong, broken, less-than. Church should be different. Church should be the place where all bodies are celebrated as fearfully and wonderfully made, as the Bible tells us in Psalm 139.

Instead, for many of us, church becomes one more place where our bodies are a problem to be managed rather than a gift to be honored.

It’s Not About Political Correctness

I can already hear some pushback. “This is just being too sensitive.” “We’ve always said ‘please stand.'” “What’s next, we can’t say anything?”

Here’s what I want you to understand: This isn’t about political correctness or culture wars or being overly cautious. 

This is about whether our theology of the body matches the one we find in Scripture.

The God we meet in the Gospels is constantly redefining what bodies matter. Jesus touches lepers. He heals on the Sabbath. He tells the woman bleeding for twelve years that her faith has made her well—not her ability to follow purity codes about bodies. He washes feet. He feeds hungry bodies. He rises in a resurrected body that still bears the scars.

The Apostle Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 12 about the body of Christ, insisting that the parts that seem weaker are indispensable and that we should give greater honor to the parts that lack it. He’s talking about the church, yes, but he uses the body metaphor deliberately. Bodies matter. All bodies. Especially the ones the world deems less valuable.

So when our liturgy implies that standing bodies are more reverent, more engaged, more worthy of the moment—we’re preaching a different gospel than the one Jesus embodied.

What Changes When We Change Our Words

Let me tell you about a church I visited last year. 

The worship leader stepped to the mic and said, “Let us prepare our hearts for the reading of God’s Word. In whatever way your body allows today—standing, sitting, swaying, resting—let us be present together.”

I actually teared up. 

It was such a small shift in language. Maybe ten extra words. But those words created space for every body in the room. They named the reality that we all come with different capacities. They made my seated body just as valid as my neighbor’s standing body.

The reading of Scripture wasn’t any less reverent. If anything, it was more sacred because more of us could fully be present without fighting our bodies or feeling shame.

Here’s what changes when we change our words:

**We stop making assumptions.** We don’t assume everyone can stand, kneel, raise hands, or bow heads. We invite participation without prescribing how it must look.

**We center belonging.** Instead of making accessibility an afterthought (“or you can sit if you need to”), we make it central to how we design the moment.

**We teach a better theology.** We demonstrate that God meets us in our actual bodies, not the bodies we wish we had or the bodies the world says are acceptable.

**We practice what we preach.** If we say all are welcome, our liturgy should prove it.

The Practical Stuff: What to Say Instead

Okay, so if “please stand” is out, what do we say instead?

I’m so glad you asked. Here are some alternatives I’ve collected from inclusive worship leaders:

**For Gospel readings or benedictions:**

– “Let us prepare to hear God’s Word”

– “Either in body or in spirit, please rise”  

– “In whatever posture allows you to be present, let us receive the Gospel”

– Simply invite people to “turn to Luke 4” without any body instruction

**For sung worship:**

– “Let us sing together” (no posture mentioned)

– “Join us in song, in whatever way your body allows today”

– “Feel free to stand, sit, sway, or simply rest as we sing”

**For prayer:**

– “Let us pray” (that’s it—no kneeling, bowing, or standing required)

– “In whatever posture feels prayerful to you, join me in prayer”

– “Whether your hands are raised, folded, open, or resting, let us pray”

Notice what these alternatives do: they still create a sense of collective participation and reverence without requiring any specific body configuration.

The sacredness isn’t in the posture. It’s in the presence—ours and God’s.

But What About Tradition?

I get it. For many of us, these phrases are woven into our liturgical DNA. “Please stand for the Gospel” feels traditional, formal, reverent. Changing it might feel like losing something.

But here’s what I’d invite you to consider: tradition is about passing on what matters most, not about freezing every practice in stone.

The early church met in homes, shared meals, and had none of the formal liturgical structures we now consider “traditional.” What they did have was a radical commitment to inclusion that scandalized their society. Enslaved people and free people. Jews and Gentiles. Women and men. All one body in Christ, as Paul wrote to the Galatians.

Our tradition is inclusion. Our tradition is making space at the table for those the world pushes to the margins. Our tradition is the upside-down kingdom where the last are first and the weak are strong, and God chooses what the world calls foolish to shame the wise.

So maybe the most traditional thing we can do is examine our practices and ask: Do these words create space for all of God’s beloveds? Or do they protect our comfort at the expense of someone else’s belonging?

The Intersection with Other Justice Work

If you’re already doing work around inclusion, racial justice, or gender equity in your church, you know this: language matters. The words we use—and don’t use—shape the culture we create.

People with disabilities make up the largest minority group in the world. We’re in your congregations, though you might not always know it because many disabilities are invisible. We’re also part of every other marginalized community. There are LGBTQ+ people with disabilities. People of color with disabilities. Women with disabilities.

Disability justice isn’t separate from your other inclusion work—it’s woven through all of it.

When you center accessibility in your liturgy, you’re not just helping people with disabilities. You’re also helping:

– Parents holding sleeping toddlers who can’t easily stand

– Pregnant people dealing with fatigue and pain

– Older adults whose bodies don’t cooperate like they used to

– Anyone dealing with temporary injury or illness

– People with anxiety who find standing in crowds overwhelming

Accessibility helps everyone. It creates a culture of care that ripples out in ways we can’t always anticipate.

An Invitation to Audit Your Liturgy

So what now? Here’s what I’d invite you to do:

**This week, listen to your own service with accessibility ears.** Print out your bulletin or worship slides. Read through your liturgy. Notice every time you give an instruction about what to do with bodies.

Ask yourself:

– Does this instruction assume a certain kind of body?

– Could someone participate fully without doing the physical action I’m describing?

– Am I creating unnecessary barriers to belonging?

– What would it cost me to change this language?

– What might it mean to someone who’s been left out?

**Talk to people with disabilities in your congregation.** We have so much wisdom to share about what works and what doesn’t. But please don’t make us do all the work of educating you—do your own learning too. 

**Start small, but start somewhere.** You don’t have to overhaul your entire liturgy this Sunday. Pick one thing. Change how you invite people into sung worship. Rework your Gospel reading introduction. Remove body instructions from one prayer.

Notice what happens. Notice who breathes easier. Notice how it feels to worship in a community that makes space for actual bodies, not imagined ones.

Here’s the Thing

Changing “please stand” to something more inclusive won’t solve all your accessibility problems. You’ve still got to think about physical space, assistive technology, sensory considerations, and a thousand other things.

But it’s a start. And starts matter.

Every time you lead worship with language that makes space for all bodies, you’re preaching a better gospel. You’re saying, with your actual words and practices, that God’s love isn’t conditional on having the “right” kind of body. You’re building the kind of church that looks more like the kingdom Jesus described—where the outcasts are centered, the forgotten are remembered, and there’s room at the table for all of us.

You’re not alone in this work. There’s a growing movement of worship leaders, liturgists, and pastors who are rethinking everything through the lens of radical inclusion. We’re sharing resources, rewriting liturgies, and cheering each other on.

Your congregation—especially the people who’ve been quietly suffering through “please stand” for years—will thank you.

And honestly? I think God will too.

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**I’d love to hear from you:** What language shifts have you made in your worship services? What’s been challenging? What’s been life-giving? Drop a comment below—your experience might be exactly what another worship leader needs to hear today.