Everything on earth is aging. People, landforms, rivers, flora and fauna, rocks and mountains.

Since the beginning of time the universe has been aging. I think of aging as inevitable change.

All people change. Infants’ muscles and bones strengthen and they are able to control a floppy body; they hold up their heads, learn to sit, walk and eventually to run. Babble becomes distinct ; words become sentences. From exploring their own bodies, babies begin to explore their surroundings. Toddlers branch out and begin their journey toward independence. It’s wonderful to watch Allison, Tanya Moering’s daughter, negotiating steps, repeating the process over and over until she feels confident when she tries it.

As children age they learn an enormous amount about the world around them before they set foot in school. Schooling introduces new changes…learning to become literate and numerate, to play and work cooperatively, to become a social being. All the while they are growing in mind and body. Teens undergo enormous changes as they age, both hormonal and emotional. They begin the search for their identity, the who am I phase. Every life stage presents changes and challenges.

In their twenties many young adults look forward to completing their formal education and to beginning an independent life…getting a job; starting a career; finding a life partner. By their thirties some people are settled into the family life, work pattern; others are still searching for how they want to live their lives.

So it goes through each decade… the forties, the fifties and even the sixties; each decade has its own rewards and challenges. But by sixty-five something different starts to happen. People become official senior citizens. We , official senior citizens, that is, get certain perks such as reduced fares on the Metro or at the movies. We also may encounter ageism. We may be the first to go when a downsizing happens in our workplace. At seventy you are no longer asked to serve on a jury. Your daughter or son may take your arm as you walk because they worry that you might fall. They treat you as an old person!

Abigail Trafford, a writer for the Washington Post’s Health Section, wrote recently about the stigma of growing old. All you have to do is watch movies or TV, or look at ads to understand what a stigma it is to look or act old. Cosmetic surgery, exercise for a young body, diets, clothing are all aimed at staying young forever. Trafford writes that, “The dramatic shift to a graying population is challenging the forever young mystique of our relatively young population. Perhaps”, she continues, “ we can’t imagine having a meaningful life after a certain age.”.

William Murry, a Unitarian Universalist minister and author disagrees with this assumption. He believes that “We need larger goals and purposes which give our lives a meaning that transcends the self.” He goes on to say that, “ Personal growth is important not merely as an end in itself, but as a way of making it possible for us to contribute more to our family and friends and to the larger community of which we are a part.” Murry’s ideas resonate with me because I’m one of the “ Older Generation”.

Last week I spoke with a person who was doing phone interviews for a research group. He assured me that he wasn’t selling anything; he was only gathering market information. So I agreed to answer his questions mostly out of curiosity about where the conversation was going. His first question was to ask to which age group I belonged. He named the possible groups to which I might belong and finally asked, sixty-five or older. “Over sixty-five”, I replied. “Thank you for your time”, he replied and hung up. Why, I thought, would my answer preclude me from participating in his research? What were his assumptions about me and were those assumptions based on my age bracket? Was this yet another example of ageism; my opinions no longer count in market research? Many studies confirm my suspicions. Youth is what matters in the market place, in programming for TV and radio, in fashion, and in the job market.

Ageism, discrimination because of age, exists in many areas and it drives both men and women who are older to resort to various methods to hold back the march of time; cosmetics and plastic surgery, extreme dieting and exercise regimes, and dressing like a twenty year old. People succumb to the forever young syndrome and the various methods of achieving youth in perpetuity to keep active in a career or to keep a job for the income needed to live. No one wants to be marginalized so people work at staying young looking to avoid the inevitable.

However, as I age I find that my life is becoming fuller and more meaningful than I thought possible. I remember my grandmother, a woman who was widowed at a very young age. She raised four children as a single woman. Her life wasn’t easy. But she never complained. She loved her children, grandchildren, her garden and her friends. Every morning she went to her garden to encourage the plants to grow, just as she encouraged her children, grandchildren and friends to grow. She told us to enjoy the beauty of the world. In her nineties she was deaf and blind, but she had inner strength. She spoke often of her beautiful memories. I think of her often. She is my heroine and inspiration. She didn’t change the world, but she made it a better place for those she knew. I remember Jane Wilhelm who was a member of this church. She was an independent woman who never complained about the difficulties in her life. She was too busy helping others. Her stories were what taught me that I could become involved in social action in a small way and even make a difference. I accept my aging and its affects on my body and mind… I’m slower physically and mentally. But I still can teach our youth, take time to enjoy my family and my friends. I can find a place for me in this beloved church and community. I savor my age and my life. As William Murry wrote, “It is what we give rather than what we get, what we do for others than what we do for ourselves, that makes life worth living. This principle lies at the heart of a liberal faith.”

I’ve completed the thoughts that led me to the next part of my “sermon”. Now I would like to try some “church work” which I call shared inquiry. When I taught a unit on the story “Tuck Everlasting”, I gave an assignment for homework that we would share orally. The assignment so enthralled the parents of my students that many of them asked if they could participate. The students also wanted me to share my thoughts with them. The assignment also evoked, in a profound way, how all who participated thought about growing older and death. As I recently examined my thoughts those long years ago and how I’ve changed, I thought it might be a valuable “church work” assignment for all of us.

First a précis of the story, at least the part that pertains to this assignment: The Tucks are traveling salespeople. Every few years they return to a small town where they camp in a wooded area. In the wood is a clear and inviting spring. Many years before the beginning of the story, the family had all drunk the water from the spring. Then, as the years passed, they noticed something quite unusual. None of the family was aging…they were the same as when they had drunk the water from the spring. The story goes on to examine how the Tucks deal with this phenomenon. If you wish to find out what happens next, you’ll have to read the story. My purpose is to use what happened to the Tuck family, that is living forever, to pose the following questions which I’d like you to consider, answer, and share if you wish.

Would you, given the opportunity, drink the water from the spring of eternal life? Why or why not? If you did drink this magic water, at what age would you like to be so that you would spend eternity at that age. Two other questions I’d like you to consider and answer for yourself and perhaps to share are: What have you left behind as you grow older, happily or regretfully? What do you look forward to as you grow older?

Take your time.