Meeting the Needs of the Older Generation

Actively embracing your faith contributes to a longer lifespan, statistics show. Eight out of ten older people say they pray regularly. Yet the spiritual needs of the elderly are often neglected. Here, Janet Parker explains why and how churches should reconsider ministry to this growing section of the congregation.

Human beings all share the same spiritual needs - love, hope, faith, something to worship and peace. We all need to feel useful, thankful, have our value accepted and we require to maintain personal dignity and self-esteem. To ignore these essential needs ignores an important part of what it means to be a human being.

This inner being needs nurturing and, as we grow in company, we need to ensure that people are able to continue to grow with others in the body of the church, whatever age they are.

Paradoxically, as our ageing population grows ever larger our society most values and celebrates youth. Instead of celebrating the accumulated knowledge and life experience of older people they are often sub-consciously labelled as ‘past their sell-by date’ and can feel that they have nothing to offer a community that seems to emphasise ‘doing’ over ‘being’. 

Services, too, can alienate older members of the congregation as we strive to accommodate the young. Worship suddenly seems inaccessible.

Perhaps it is not surprising then that, although most older people in our society grew up with some connection to the church, if only by having attended Sunday School, research now is showing some disaffection with organised religion.

Many people, church-goer or not, like Christian Principles and expect the Church to engage with society’s social agendas.

For some, spirituality lies at the heart of religion. But for many personal spiritual experience has become more significant than communal church life with a consequent loss of belonging. I often hear older people speak of believing in a creator God but having no belief in life after death.

If we accept this decline, allowing older people to become marginalized or excluded, not only are we are missing the potential of a large and ever-growing group of people, we run the risk of them also losing hope - something to look forward to in this life and hope of life in the next.

The Church is letting people down if they are denied hearing the Gospel proclaimed and explained.
It is not just the older members of our congregations who will lose out if we don’t recognise and make use of the talents and experience that they  still have to offer.

In the Diocese of Oxford the Board for Social Responsibility has been working on a project called Spiritual Care for older People (SCOP) which has looked at the issues for older people in  our church communities.

SCOP has explored ways to meet the spiritual needs of our older generation and hopes to raise awareness of these needs, allowing churches to consider their practices and adjust them where necessary.

At Diocesan Synod last month we launched a new resource pack for parishes with fact sheets full of information and ideas to enable them to provide effective ministry to and by the elderly, from the way we talk to older members of our congregation to how we value them and include them. It looks at how we might meet their spiritual needs and what they might still wish to offer.

We are also arranging training events addressing a range of pastoral and practical issues and offering support to parishes in their outreach to older people.

Janet Parker is consultant adviser to the SCOP project.

Training and information
SCOP resource packs are available from Alison Webster, Social Responsibility Adviser, priced £5. Contact Alison on 01865 208213 or by email

Future training event dates include:
Wednesday 26 April in Faringdon focusing on the topic of visiting.
Tuesday 3 October in Abingdon focusing on the topic of worship.

On Thursday 6 July a major conference on ‘The  spiritual and pastoral needs of older people’ is being planned in Oxford.

For further details contact Janet Parker on 01367 870 394 or by email