Growing a Heart for Disability Ministry – Wilame Leal Silva

In our final episode of season 5, we hear from Joni and Friends team member Wilame Leal Silva. He and his wife Erica Leal were overjoyed to hear they were pregnant with their second child. Then doctors gave a diagnosis that sent them reeling. Their son, they were told, had trisomy 13, a condition likely to end the baby’s life soon after birth. Even if Daniel survived, doctors said, he would be severely disabled and not live long. Grieved facing the loss of their son—and pressured to terminate the pregnancy—Wilame and Erica experienced disability in a new way. And while their son—to doctors’ amazement—was born without a disability, Wilame and Erica live with lasting deep empathy for families living with disability. Wilame joins the podcast to tell his family’s story, and share how God led him into disability ministry.