I am not a huge Johnny Cash fan (though after reading this blog series on the theology of Johnny Cash, I gotta say: my esteem and curiosity both have been piqued). There is a Johnny Cash song, however, that I think about a fair bit. It was the last song he ever recorded, after some 50 years as a performer, and all the volatile victories and hard losses that “the Man in Black” lived through in that time. It’s a cover of the Trent Reznor song, “Hurt.”
I am not a huge Trent Reznor fan, either, but I do know that he was the controversial front man for a hard-rock act named Nine Inch Nails, and the song “Hurt” was the last song on their 1994 album The Downward Spiral. Whole album is a painful record of Reznor’s despairing life-reflections, shot through with themes of violence, nihilism and social deviance. In Reznor’s own words, it’s about “somebody systematically throwing off every layer of what he’s surrounded with ... from personal relationships, to religion to questioning the whole situation.”
And like I say, this exploration of the end of all things good and bright culminates with a song called “Hurt,” a transparent lament that confesses all Reznor’s spiritual failings: deceit, drugs, destruction, self-injury. It opens with the line, “I hurt myself today, to see if I still feel / I focus on the pain, the only thing that’s real.” Later in the song he says: “And you could have it all / my empire of dirt / I will let you down / I will make you hurt.”
It’s all very dark stuff, but the very last line—the album’s final word after spiraling downward for a full 65 minutes and 2 seconds—is this haunting phrase: “If I could start again / a million miles away / I would keep myself / I would find a way.” Now: I admit it’s pretty faint, barely audible maybe, and I doubt Reznor himself would put this word to it, but in this final breath at the end of the album, he seems to be asking about “redemption.”
And this is where, interestingly, Johnny Cash comes in. Because in 2003, at the age of 71, Johnny Cash covered “Hurt.” And, while he did it in classic Johnny Cash style, still he stayed faithful to the original, with the exception of just one word. There’s a line in the song that uses a synonym for human excrement that rhymes with “spit.” It goes: “I wear my crown of (rhymes with spit) upon my liar’s chair / full of broken thoughts / I cannot repair.” Cash took that obscene, filthy “crown” and replaced it with this phrase: “I wear my crown of thorns upon my liar’s chair.” A crown of thorns for a crown of s**t.
Here’s Johnny Cash’s video for “Hurt.” It’s interspersed with footage from his life and career: his own empire of dirt. The video ends, poignantly, tellingly, soberly, with a scene of the crucifixion of Christ: Cash offers that name as the answer to this hurting cry for redemption.
Polishing Up My Proverbs 16 Crown of Glory (Part VI): Johnny Cash and the Gifts of Old Age
Polishing Up My Proverbs 16 Crown of Glory (Part V): Christian Community as the Fountain of Youth?
They say that Okinanwa, a small island off the southern coast of Japan, has the highest rate of centenarians in the world. Proportionally, that is to say, more people in Okinawa live beyond the age of 100 than anywhere else on the planet. Not only do people live longer in Okinawa, but they also enjoy relatively good health into their centenarian years, with the lowest rates of age-related disease—coronary heart disease, stroke, cancer and so on—of any people-group in the world.
So remarkable is the Okinawan life-expectancy, that the island has become something of a tourist attraction for the Japanese, who visit it not to lounge on the beaches or to see the sights, but specifically and expressly for a first-hand encounter with a genuine Okinawan Centenarian. Imagine photo albums full of pictures of Japanese tourists doing the say-cheese-finger-V-thing, next to a bunch of Okinawan senior citizens, and you’ll get the idea.
Scientists have been scratching their heads over the phenomenon of Okinawan longevity for a while now. What, in particular, do the Okinawan people have going for them, that they are able to live so well for so long, well after the rest of the world, on average, has succumbed to the aches and pains of old age?
There are probably a number of active ingredients in the Okinawan elixir of youth. Caloric restriction and healthy diet seem to play a role (Okinawans simply eat less food than most Westerners, and what they do eat is mostly plants). Genetics and lifestyle are also factors (Okinawans are much more active throughout their lives, well into their senior years).
But in a study of Okinawan longevity that I read recently, a crucial factor stood out to me for special consideration, especially as it relates to my interest in developing a theology of aging. Put simply: Okinawan culture places a high value on old age. Rather than seeing it as the beginning of the end, Okinawans see old age as a badge of honour and a cause for celebration. Rather than shuffling the aged off to out of the way “homes” where they are left to live out their final years with other seniors, Okinawans make all kinds of space for the elderly in their communities, their families, their society. Rather than being treated like an inconvenience, the aged are cherished, respected, and, above all, embedded in the broader community.
Okinawans who have passed their 100th birthday, in particular, are given a great degree of freedom, respect and license. The centenarian years are viewed as a “second childhood”; and not in a condescending way, but in a permissive way, similar to how young children are humoured and admired and cherished as a vital part of the community. As I understand it, it’s not uncommon for the younger generation actually to vie with one another for the honour of getting to care for their centenarians in their old age.
Could it really be that growing old happens best in cultures that wisely embrace aging, that view it with healthy respect, even appreciation, that warmly and ungrudgingly welcome the fact of getting old, and have learned to celebrate the simple achievement of living long and well?
The mystery of Okinawan longevity suggests it’s so.
And so, of course, does the Bible. It’s not for nothing that the Torah instructs us to stand in the presence of the elderly (Leviticus 19:32). And it’s not for nothing that the New Testament instructs the young to cherish the old with special deference (See: 1 Timothy 5:1, 1 Peter 5:5) and further instructs the old to share the gifts of their age and experience generously with the young (see 1 John 2:13).
In the broadest strokes, the Bible paints a picture of a community where old age is seen as a profound spiritual resource, and where the bonds between young and old are strong and rich and reciprocal; and in that picture we see the spiritual flourishing of young and old alike, the thriving of community as a whole, a little glimpse of shalom.
A church with a robust, biblical theology of aging, I think, will adopt an attitude towards old age more like that of the Okinawan people—where the community makes much space and affords much dignity to the old—and less like that of the West—where the practice is, by and large, to remove the very old from community whenever the realities of old age become too great an inconvenience. To “stand in the presence of the elderly,” today, as a Christian, is to resist this modern, Western impulse to segregate by generation, and to do all we can to maintain those strong, rich, reciprocal bonds between young and old that are so vital to a shalom-oriented community.
We may actually find, in doing so, that our own experience of growing old becomes one filled with health and wisdom and vitality and joy.
Polishing Up My Proverbs 16 Crown of Glory (Part IV): A Biblical Theory of Aging
It turns out that no one really knows why we age, exactly. To be clear: growing old is simply a matter of the chronological passage of time. That much is understood. But why we age—why, that is, our bodies should change, and especially, deteriorate as we grow old, why skin should lose its elasticity and eyesight its precision, why muscles should lose their tone and bones their density and mental processes their alacrity—medical science does not have an especially penetrating explanation for this.
In the words of that old Iron Maiden song (yes, Iron Maiden; kids, back in my day, the rockers were also the philosophers...): “There’s a time to live, but isn’t it strange that as soon as we’re born we’re dying.”
But why?
Why shouldn’t our cells be able to reproduce indefinitely? Why shouldn’t bones continually maintain their density, or muscles their tone? Why shouldn’t accumulated experience just keep sharpening our mental processes without end or limit?
Science can’t say, exactly.
At least, according to Doctor Andrew Weil, one of America’s leading gerontologists, science can’t. To be sure, there are theories. In his book, Healthy Aging, Dr. Weil surveys some of the best.
There’s the “Genetic Loss” theory of aging, for instance. Apparently, every time your cells reproduce, they lose tiny bits of genetic material from their DNA (humans lose approximately 0.6% of their heart muscle DNA each year, for instance). Over time, this gradual loss of DNA shows up in our bodies as, well, saggy skin, noodly muscles, brittle bones, and so on. On this theory, as best as I can tell, aging is kind of like a prolonged genetic mutation.
Then there’s the “Telomere Theory”. Telomoeres are the end bits of our chromosomes, and their job is to keep said chromosomes from genetically “fraying” (they’ve been compared to the plastic cap on the end of your shoelace). Telomeres have a tendency to shorten over time; and when they grow too short, they activate a mechanism that prevents further cell multiplication. Well: nothing says “old pair of shoes” worse than when the shoe-laces are all frayed.
The theory I found most interesting, however, is the “Reproductive-Cell Cycle” theory. The idea here is that, early on in life, our bodies naturally produce reproductive hormones designed to promote cell growth and ensure, especially, that we reach the age of sexual reproduction; but later in life, in a futile attempt to maintain sexual reproduction past our prime, these same hormones become disregulated and start to drive senescence instead (senescence is the fancy word for the way your body falls apart as you get old). In short: it’s our sex drive, actually, that’s killing us.
Well; I’m light-years from being an expert on any of this, but that was my lay-man’s understanding of Dr. Weil’s book.
And I’m not sharing any of this to be morbid. Or flippant. It’s just, in a previous post I spoke about the reverence the Bible has for old age, and how it tries to encourage the same in us; and it’s just possible my post may have elicited some knowing smiles or downright scoffs from readers who, like me, have passed a 40-something-eth birthday and are noticing for the first time that their bodies just won’t do what they used to do, and have begun to do all sorts of things they never did before, instead.
Reverence for old-age indeed!
So, any thorough theology of aging will eventually have to come to terms with the hard truth that, just because Proverbs 16 calls my quickly-graying hair a crown of glory, that doesn’t change the fact that the hair’s still grey. And thinning. And the fellow it’s crowning feels somewhat less glorious than he did back when he was 20-something and full of vim and vinegar.
When we do come to terms with this truth—the fact that old age involves loss and deterioration as much as it does growth and gain—we discover the flip-side of the Bible’s teaching on the matter. Regardless how medical science may try to explain the phenomenon, biblically speaking, aging is not only a gift from God, it is also a divine limit placed on us by God.
The definitive text on this one is Genesis 6:3, where God, in response to the seemingly endless proliferation of human sin, says this: “My Spirit will not contend with human beings forever, for they are mortal. Their days shall be a hundred and twenty years.” Here, I think, we have the first solid theological word on the aging process. Cells lose their genetic material over time, telomeres shorten and chromosomes fray, reproductive hormones eventually begin to wear down the very organisms they once helped to sexually reproduce, because God, in his wisdom, knew that we needed to have limits placed on us. And he saw what we might become without them.
In another definitive text, Psalm 90:10 underscores this basic idea. The context is again a reflection on God’s right response to human sin, and it says, “Our days may come to seventy years, or perhaps eighty if strength endures, but the best of them are but trouble and sorrow, for they quickly pass and we fly away.”
The Bible seems quite convinced on this one. God in his wisdom has placed an upper limit on the length of the human life-span. And spiritually speaking, healthy aging is about learning to live well, fully and wisely and contentedly, within those limits. For lack of a better image, aging is about the joy of colouring inside the lines of the human life-span.
It is interesting, of course, to speculate on the meaning of the Resurrection within this theological framework. Because all genuinely Christian theology must end, eventually, with Christ; and the promise of the empty tomb is in fact a resurrected body where, presumably, cells reduplicate without genetic loss and God binds up the fraying telomeres of the broken-hearted. But that is far more speculative than I wish to get today, except, perhaps, to say this: if the promise of the Gospel is indeed eternal life in Jesus Christ, then for Christians, it would seem, Christ himself actually replaces aging as God's divine limitation on human life.
Food for thought.
But while that simmers on the back-burner, let me just make my main point one more time. Biblically speaking, graceful aging—Proverbs-16-glory-crowned aging, that is—begins when we accept the reality of aging not simply as a divine gift to us, but also as a divine limitation placed on us.
Of course, for the wise, those two things aren’t really all that different, in the end.
Polishing Up My Proverbs 16 Crown of Glory (Part III): A Ripe Old Age
Polishing Up My Proverbs 16 Crown of Glory, Part II: (North) American Idol
These are all helpful definitions, and one could make a biblical case for each of them. But I heard a theologian on the radio a few months ago who suggested that an idol is any object we turn to and trust in as a source of power. While it isn’t the only thing an idol is, this definition, too, finds biblical precedence. Just read the Book of Revelation, which is, among other things, an exposé on the idolatrous nature of the power structures of the Roman Empire, and you'll get a glimpse of this dynamic at work.
People worship idols because they believe, falsely, that the things these idols represent will give them power. Or, put differently, people worship idols because the things they represent give them a certain kind of power. Either way, idolatry is about making the appropriate sacrifices and offering the appropriate worship to some thing, in order to secure power.
This aspect of idolatry is helpful to bear in mind as we try to sketch out, in broad strokes, a theology of aging. Because, if the cultural trends and spending habits of North American society are any indication, Youth is one of the great idols of our time.
In 2011, for instance, Americans spent somewhere around $80 billion (yes, billion with a “b”) dollars on anti-aging products and procedures. Something like $2.2 billion dollars was spent on anti-aging skin creams and lotions, and billions more on anti-aging drugs and hormone therapies. $330 million was spent on colouring grey hair, alone. The biggest bucks, however, went to age-masking cosmetic surgery procedures. One website I visited claimed that over $10 billion worth of cosmetic procedures were performed in 2011, including: five million Botox injections, over one million chemical facials and hundreds of thousands of face lifts.
Analysts project that this year, in 2015, Americans will spend over $114 billion dollars to hide, reverse or slow the effects of aging.
And don’t get me started on Hollywood. While everywhere else in our culture, the saying goes, “40 is the new 30,” in Hollywood it's “30 is the new 40.” According to this article, the average age of male Oscar winners has been steadily dropping, from 51 in the eighties, to 47 in the nineties, to 45 in the 2000s. At the same time, the average career-length of most actors has been steadily contracting. Few actors starting out these days expect to see much work past their 40s. It’s worst for women: according to one study, a Hollywood actress’ salary, on a per-movie basis, begins to decline rapidly after they reach the age of 34.
I could go on, and talk about the trend of marketing toys—not metaphorical toys, but real, actual children’s playthings—to adults who are still “kids at heart.” Or I could talk about how that very expression “kid at heart,” conveys the image in our popular mythology of someone who has tapped into some deep spring of spiritual wisdom. I could go on, like I say, but I’m starting to sound like a curmudgeon.
It doesn’t take much work to connect all these dots and realize that we are a youth-obsessed culture. With only a bit more work, however, we might see how idolatrous this obsession actually is. One of the reasons we obsess with youth, I think, is because we associate it with a superficial kind of power. To be young (we believe) is to be energetic, virile, beautiful, innovative, creative, spontaneous, adventurous. And one of the reasons we deny, avoid or combat aging is because, whatever else it means, we believe (falsely, I'd argue) that aging means losing these things: our energy, our virility, our creativity, our beauty. Not to sound too melodramatic, but the god of “Youth” promises to help us retain all these things, so long, of course, as we make the appropriate sacrifices and offer him due worship.
If Youth is one of the idols of our time, or even if it’s just a cultural obsession but hasn’t quite hit the level of full on idolatry yet, either way, it’s important to note that the Bible does not share our culture’s unqualified enthusiasm for all things young. Let me be clear. I am not saying that the Bible doesn’t value youth or cherish children (Matthew 18:5-7, anyone?). I am only saying that the Bible does not see young-ness as a source of power the way our culture seems to; or at least the Bible does not place a premium on the kinds of power that come, in particular, from being young.
A few verses here will sketch out the general picture. In Proverbs 16:31, for instance, it’s gray hair that is one’s crown of splendor (and by metonomy, an old life well lived). Leviticus 19:32 instructs the people to “stand in the presence of the elderly.” In 1 Kings 12:9, the worst indictment it has for King Rehoboam is that he ignored the counsel of his elders and followed, instead, the advice of the young men he grew up with. The Psalmists beseeches God not to remember, in particular, the sins of his youth. And in Isaiah 3:4, one of the worst consequences predicted for the apostate nation is that they will become a people governed by children.
This is a subtle but crucial difference between a Biblical worldview and our modern contemporary worldview, when it comes to aging. In terms of human character, modern North American culture places a premium on those things that come with youth, be it the playfulness or the energy or the novelty. In contrast, the Bible tends to place a premium on those things that come with age: the wisdom, the experience, the steadfastness.
To put it poetically, in a biblical world-view, the human heart is more like a bottle of fine wine than it is like the latest ipod gadget. It does not grow obsolete, rather invaluable, with age: more complex in personality and more refined in character.
At least it should become these things. Biblically, we might say, aging was meant to be one of those processes whereby God refines the character, deepens our relationship with him, and enriches the community of his people. But—and this is the point I really want to make to day—in order for it to be this kind of a process for us, it will mean dismantling the altars we've built to that fickle god called Youth.
But then Dr. Weil offers this very wise medical advice when it comes to growing old. The first step towards healthy aging, he says, is not to take a hormone supplement or apply a skin cream or undergo some medical procedure or other. The first step, actually, towards enjoying physical, mental and emotional health well into our senior years, is to embrace—not just to accept but to embrace—aging as an altogether natural, even welcome part of human life. (And if you're part of a community that sees aging the same way, that doesn't hurt none, either.)
Dr. Weil's a doctor, not a pastor, of course, so he doesn't also acknowledge how profoundly biblical this position is, but let me do so here. Whatever theological implications there are to the Bible's perspective on old age, it turns out that when it tells us to open our eyes and see how beautiful and deep and wise and insightful people can become as they grow old, it's telling us for our own good.
Polishing up my Proverbs 16 Crown of Glory (Part I): Outnumbered 4 to 1?
One of the tasks I had to complete when I was finishing my training to be a pastor was something we affectionately called the MRRP (pronounced “merp”), that is: a Ministry Related Research Project. The idea was to choose an issue that was of concrete relevance to the local church, research it thoroughly, and develop a practical project to address it. When I wrote my MRRP, I had almost no real experience as a pastor, so I chose a topic that was of concrete relevance to me, in particular, and I just took it for granted that it would be of relevance to the church local, too.
I am still convinced that the topic I chose back in 2008, Christian Faith and Care of the Environment, is of vital importance to the church, and I’ve actually had a number of opportunities to follow up on my research in practical ways since becoming a pastor. So I’m not saying I regret my decision, by any means. But in the years since my Seminary days, every once in a while this thought strikes me: “If you were to do a Ministry Related Research Project today, with 6+ years of real ministry experience behind you, and, hopefully, a much more accurate picture of what issues really are of vital importance to the church, which would you choose?”
Lately when I ask myself that question—what pressing issue especially needs theological clarity and fresh creativity and careful attention to biblical detail, today?—the topic that comes first to mind is this one: How can and ought the church do seniors ministry in ways that are theologically faithful, biblically informed and pastorally responsive to the unique spiritual issues that accompany aging?
Sorry, that was how you wrote MRRP research questions back then. Let me try again. Seniors Ministry: how do we do it faithfully, biblically and well?
Please don’t click “Next Blog” just yet!
I know that ministry to, with and among seniors—the elderly, retirees, the aged and aging—this whole vaguely-defined demographic—is not nearly so “exotic” as almost every other ministry focus: ministry to the marginalized, global missions, consumerism and social justice, sexual identity questions, you name it. But it is, I am increasingly convinced, something that churches neglect to their determent, their loss and, (dare I say) their failure.
And generally speaking, we do neglect it. I realize that a few entries in the Amazon search bar hardly counts as hard data (and let me assure you, I was much more vigorous in researching my actual MRRP!) but for curiosity’s sake this afternoon, I went to Amazon.ca and queried: “Youth Ministry.”
12,274 results.
Then I queried “Seniors Ministry.”
2,797 results.
Even if you add the results I got for “Ministry to the Elderly” (325) and “Ministry to the Aged” (178), bringing the total to 3,300 results, still, it sort of makes you go hmmm... to think that Amazon has almost 4 Youth Ministry items in their catalogue, for every 1 item they have on Seniors Ministry. And just to add more specious data to the mix, when I searched Google for a “Youth Pastor Job” I turned up about 1,280,000 hits; searching for “Pastor to Senior Adults jobs,” got me 325,000 hits. Again the ratio between the two, roughly speaking, is 4:1.
Does the church really have 4 times more interest in youth ministry than it does in ministering to, with and among the elderly?
I don’t know. There are all sorts of ways to interpret these results so that they say nothing at all about the church’s interest in, commitment to or readiness for ministry among the aged (e.g. Seniors ministry is not so easily distinguished from ministry generally, like Youth ministry is; Seniors ministry is often not a formalized ministry, the way Youth Ministry is, etc.). But still, 4:1 feels right on a gut level. For every pastor I’ve known who felt called specifically to minister to seniors, I’m sure I’ve known 4 who felt called to Youth Ministry.
But again, I have no clue if the 4:1 ratio is even remotely accurate. Even if it’s not, however, the real point I’m trying to make today still stands. A church that inordinately emphasizes youth without also thinking through the unique discipleship opportunities that come along with aging, the unique challenges to spiritual formation that the elderly face, the unique blessing to the community of Faith that seniors are, and the unique role, biblically, that elders were meant to play in the spiritual formation of youth—that church is missing something vital.
More than simply missing something. If recent findings by Stats Canada are any indication, a church without a robust “theology of aging” that in turn inspires practical ministry initiatives among the elderly, may find itself missing some crucial Gospel-opportunities in Canada’s New Millennium. Stats Canada predicts that by 2030, seniors (65 and older) will make up 24% of the Canadian population (up from 15% in 2013). In the next 50 years, they say, the number of octogenarians (80 years and older) will have tripled, going from 1.4 million today, to around 5 million by 2063.
These numbers are intriguing. They become pressing when paired with Stats Canada’s prediction that the number of people between 15-64 (i.e. those of working age) will decline, from 69% today, to somewhere around 60% by 2030. (See http://www.cbc.ca/news/business/canada-s-seniors-population-to-jump-workforce-decline-by-2063-1.2770359 for details.).
In short: over the next few decades, Canada’s population will see a significant increase in the number of seniors, and, at the same time, a decrease in the number of young adults. Most analysts wonder about the strain this shift will put on the work-force, the healthcare system, the Canada pension plan, the nuclear family. Churches, I think, should be wondering about this: how do we do seniors ministry faithfully, biblically and well?
I am not planning on rewriting my MRRP anytime soon, but I am planning, over the next few weeks here at terra incognita, to ask this very question in a variety of ways. My plan is to draw out some key biblical themes that should inform a Christian’s perspective on aging (which is, it turns out, often directly at odds with the secular culture’s perspective on aging), and my goal is to sketch out a theological framework for thinking about and talking about, and especially, ministering to the aged.
It may be that these issues seem especially pressing to me because I turned 41 last spring (my reticence to include that detail in this post is probably a sign that the culture I was socialized in is in more desperate need of a “theology of aging” than I realize). But whatever the reason, I find that it’s on my mind more than ever these days, the theological meaning of growing old.
If you, like me until recently, have always given 4 times (or more) thought to everything else other than aging, and never really suspected that the Christian Faith actually has some wonderfully counter-cultural things to say about this mysterious activity that all of us, whether we realize it or not, are doing every minute of every day, let me invite you to join me here in asking it: What does the Bible have to say about what it means to grow old?