wfn.org | John Fife addresses older adult ministry breakfast

[PCUSA.NEWS@ecunet.org]

03-July-1996 
 
GA96073 
 
John Fife addresses older adult ministry breakfast 
 
ALBUQUERQUE--At their Tuesday morning breakfast, 125 members and guests of 
the Presbyterian Older Adults Ministry Network (POAMN), heard a message 
from John Fife, former moderator of the General Assembly (1992).  From 
Psalm 92, he read: "In old age they still produce fruit; always green and 
full of sap." 
 
    "Have you been to Florida lately?" he asked. Using statistics which 
project that by 2025, the proportion of people over 65 in America will be 
the same as now exists in  Florida (1 in 5),  he said, "Florida is the 
future."  Turning to the church, he noted that Presbyterians, as a group, 
are aging faster than the nation.   The church will face profound 
challenges to its life as the Baby Boomer generation approaches retirement 
age.   Describing this event as an "age wave," he noted that "Baby Boomers 
have been dominating the cultural environment all their lives.  We should 
expect nothing to change when they turn 65." 
 
    Addressing both the future and the present condition of the church, 
Fife spoke of a church transformed by the special gifts of those considered 
elderly.  Such a church will take advantage of the enormous resources 
available to it in the maturity, experience, time, freedom, and financial 
assets of its older members.  He suggested that older persons act as 
spiritual guides for the young, to the benefit of the whole church. 
"Consider yourselves not retired, but re-hired," he told the POAMN 
audience. 
 
    Speaking of all the abilities of those 65 and above, he cited the 
example of Maggie Kuhn, Presbyterian founder of the Gray Panthers, who, who 
despite physical problems, lived an active and vital life well past her 
forced retirement.  Her epitaph reads, "Here lies Maggie Kuhn, under the 
only stone she left unturned." 
 
 
Dee Wade 

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