Until I got involved in church in my late 30s, I had few relationships with people much older than I was. Like many Americans of my generation, I left the town where I grew up and lived in places far from my family. I practiced law in several different offices, and the age-range of my colleagues was always limited, usually no more than 20 years. The neighborhoods where my partner and I lived were a little more diverse, but relationships across the generations were rare there, too.
Then I experienced a call to ministry. As a non-churchgoing soul, I had far more questions than answers about what a call to ministry meant, but I did know one thing – I needed to find a church I could call home. The church I found several months later was a place that welcomed and challenged me, a place with intellectual and spiritual integrity. It was also a lively community whose members ranged from 10 months to 85 years in age. For people with extended families who get together regularly, that last characteristic might seem like no big deal. To me, though, it was a novelty that became a revelation.
What the age span of that congregation revealed to me was how impoverished my adult life had been because of the lack of cross-generational friendships. It helped me see how often the richness of that kind of relationship had been missing from my life.
Ten years later and several thousand miles away from that particular church, I’m in Sonoma, known as a good place for retirement living, and I’m in another congregation with a wide range of ages, literally from one to 100. Although we have some thin spots in our age demographic, we still have the joy of being a community where kids and senior citizens spend time with each other. We are a place where people who’ve lived through almost all of the startling changes of the 20th century can swap stories with people who know only this century.
I’ve recently heard the claim that churches and other faith communities are the only places left where people of several generations know and love one another. Fortunately, that’s an exaggeration. Even in my short time in Sonoma, I’ve seen youth, young adults and older adults all coming together to create and present drama, comedy and music. At the same time, though, I’m aware of how many age-restricted housing developments we have here, and I know that segregation often leads to alienation, ignorance and suspicion.
Thinking about generational diversity – and its lack – has left me longing for a couple of things for Sonoma and beyond. The first is an awareness of the very real differences in the life experiences of different generations. Growing up with intimate knowledge of farm animals and growing up with instant information about the horrors of Darfur and suicide bombers shape human beings in profoundly different ways.
My second longing arises from the first – I long for a widespread curiosity about those differences. I want us all to nurture, not a sense that one set of experiences was harder or richer or more important, but a desire to see one another more fully in our commonalities and our differences. In my faith perspective, seeing people more fully means seeing God more fully, so intergenerational relationships offer the gift of encountering a God who works in all people across time, cultures and life experiences. Without those intergenerational connections, we have a much more limited sense of God and the sacred web of life. With them, we open ourselves to greater grace and love, two things we and the rest of the world desperately need.
The Rev. Nancy Alma Taylor is Pastor of the First Congregational Church of Sonoma, UCC.
my short time in Sonoma, I’ve seen youth, young adults and older adults all coming together to create and present drama, comedy and music. At the same time, though, I’m aware of how many age-restricted housing developments we have here, and I know that segregation often leads to alienation, ignorance and suspicion.
Thinking about generational diversity – and its lack – has left me longing for a couple of things for Sonoma and beyond. The first is an awareness of the very real differences in the life experiences of different generations. Growing up with intimate knowledge of farm animals and growing up with instant information about the horrors of Darfur and suicide bombers shape human beings in profoundly different ways.
My second longing arises from the first – I long for a widespread curiosity about those differences. I want us all to nurture, not a sense that one set of experiences was harder or richer or more important, but a desire to see one another more fully in our commonalities and our differences. In my faith perspective, seeing people more fully means seeing God more fully, so intergenerational relationships offer the gift of encountering a God who works in all people across time, cultures and life experiences. Without those intergenerational connections, we have a much more limited sense of God and the sacred web of life. With them, we open ourselves to greater grace and love, two things we and the rest of the world desperately need.
The Rev. Nancy Alma Taylor is Pastor of the First Congregational Church of Sonoma, UCC.
