Prayers of Celebration:

Giving Life to Older Adults

I was reading recently about a psychologist at Yale who says that our stereotypes of older adults affect our health as we age.  Those of us who have a more positive view of aging (that older adults are capable, active and full of life) seem to live an average of 7 years longer than those of us who have a negative view of aging (that older adults are sickly, helpless, and grumpy!)  Wow, I thought, that’s a pretty big difference. 

Recent research by some of those same psychologists at Yale and Berkeley further refines our understanding of age-related stereotypes.  They found that negative stereotypes can be changed through current events in our lives. 

The extent to which this is true for those of us in church congregations is worth investigating.  It means that our church can be an important player in the health, well-being and length of life of the older adults in their congregation.

For instance, during the prayers of the church each Sunday, it seems that the majority of the names listed, are those of older adults.  Sunday after Sunday, Month after Month, Year after Year, the message sinks in;  we hold up the names of older adults because the are sickly and in need of our help.

Perhaps, if our churches not only held up our names during the prayers of the church because of our recent falls or illnesses, our churches could also identify in prayers of celebration, older adult members in their congregations who are capable, active and full of life in one way or another.

“Why would you do that?” you might ask.  “Why single out a few older adults each Sunday who took a long bike trip, are active on a city committee, or took their grandchild to visit colleges? for example.”  

The reason is because the ways we get noticed are important to our sense of who we are – our identity.  If we older adults always seem to be the ones who need the care and concern of the church, that’s the way we think about ourselves.  But if we and our age-mates are also identified for our contributions to life around us, no matter how modest, we older adults can see ourselves as active and engaged.   It will affect our health!

“Why not do that for everyone, then?” you might next ask.   “Sure, why not.” I’d say. “Go for it!”  But this is a blog about older adults.  So at least for now I’ll stick to that topic.  

  Bruce