THE HONORING OF PARENTS

May 17, 1987, 11:00 a.m. Worship Service
John Buchanan
Fourth Presbyterian Church, Chicago

Scripture
Exadus 20:1-17
Ephesians 6:1-4

“Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land
which the Lord your God gives you." ~Exodus 20:12 (RSV)

That is the text this morning. “Honor your parents - that your days
may be Jong." 1 should Jike to put beside it several other texts for the
purposes of tllumination... First, Robert Browning...

"Grow old along with me!

The best is yet to be,

The last of life for which the first was- made;
Our times are in his hand

who saith, 'A whole I planned: youth shows
but half: trust God; see all: nor be afraid.”

My. third text grows out of the soil of human experience, Chicago,

Tllinecis,: the United States of America, in the year of our Lord 1987. Tt
is not a poem. It is not romantic. It is not inspiring. It is what older
people say with ereat consislenucy when we take the time to Fisten. Ie poes

like this.

"T used to Lhbink thal old people must be afraid of dying. But now
T'm old and you know what scares me more than dying? Living... What will I
do if IT get hurt or realty sick? All ] can do is hope and pray that TF die
quickly."

Those are the perimeters for a sermon based on the Fifth Commandment,
about aging: in America, It is. I] submit, one of the very few topics which

is relevant to everyone of us... without exception... for you are either
yourself an older person... (For the moment, we will ‘leave the definition

intentionally ambiguous. I lave made a discovery that for me at least, the
definition of “middle age" and “old age" keeps changing!)

In any event. you are either an older person, or your parents are
older persons or you will one-day, God willing, be an older person
yourself. There is a sense in which it is the wost relevant topide. - Self

interest alone dictates that we pay attention to it.

But first, the Bible, the Fifth Commandment: “Honor your father and
your mother, that. your days may be long in the land which the Lord your God
gives you." :

The Ten Commandments were received by the tribes of Israel-in the
midst of their wandering through the Sinai wilderness. It is not accurate
to refer. to them as a-nation prior to that. For several generations they
chad been a captive people in Egypt. They were a loose federation of
Semitic tribes. No more. After the Exodus, during the period of wandering
in the wilderness, the idea of nationhood was born among them. And the
initial impetus, the primal structure for their sense of themselves as a
nation was the covenant with God and. the law and at its heart ‘the
Decalogue, the building blocks for-a new society in which God would be
king, and in which God's will and plan-for..the whole creation would be
done. These Ten Commandments are far more important than rules. for every
day conduct. They are the:principles upon:which:.a people could live ina
faithful relationship with God. They are the foundation upon. which the new
society, its customs, traditions and institutions would be built.

The Fifth Commandment reflects an important principle of this new
society. The family willbe its basic unit. Family must be preserved,
protected, nartured. ;

Marriage is so highly valued that somewhere in the ancient-law it is
forbidden for a newly married soldier to be sent away to battle for a
period of time after the wedding: a wise and-very pragmatic idea if there
_ever was one! Children were to obey, respect, and-be loyal.

‘Now Old festament scholars and historians help us to see that there
is something else going on in the Fifth Commandment, something potentially
more important than a guideline for parents and child. The real focus of
the Fifth Commandment, it has been suggested, is aging in general, and in
particular adults who had to cope with the reality of an aging parent. In
-tribal culture, where people are always on the-move, one who is crippled,
or sick,-or unable to keep up,:can bea problem.:..The Fifth Commandment'!s
eal-interest, the scholars suggest, is to prohibit the prevalent practice
at the time of abandoning the elderly when they were no longer capable of
caring for themselves -.a practice preserved in-some- cultures in the world
today overtly and in others, quietly, surreptitiously... [See The
Interpreter's Bible, Vol. i, p. 985]

The real intent of the Fifth Commandment is not simply that children
_treat their parents politely, but a whole, stable, societal system in which
age is honored and in which all the elderly are regarded as the parents of
Lhe. culture, who must be valued and cared for,. for the welfare ‘and health
of the culture itself... The Fifth Commandment. has everything in the world
to.do with politics and economics, that..is to say.

Many centuries later Jesus of Nazareth illustrated the principle. He
was a part of the culture which was built on the Fifth Commandment. The
best deductions are that Joseph his father died long before Jesus arrived
tt the age of thirty. According.to. the normative custom Jesus. would have

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5-17-87

learned his father's trade, and upon -his-death assumed.the business ‘and the
responsibility of the -household:..:itcis -tikely,.-therefore,.:that many of.
those thirty years were spent:.in-the-carpenter :shop-and caring for his
mother and brothers and sisters. The Gospe) narrative indicates that. Jesus
continued to care. for-his. mother. during his public:winistry. There is-no
more eloquent,;.. nor poignant. example of Hebrew family solidarity than: Jesus,
near death,:remembering.to ask his.dear friend-to.care.for, and-assume-his
responsibility for his. mother. :

One of. the major: concerns. facing:-our culture <at this. point in history
is the. family... We -have,. everyone ‘agrees, a crisis-on our. hands.» The”
family: in: America has. changed fundamentally... As we have: become urban,.. :
mobile and affluent, -the traditional functions of. the family —. which, when
you think°about it, remained: fairly consistent from the time of Moses into
the Twentieth Century - those functions have been,’ one by one, stripped
away and-assumed by other institutions. "Home" seems sometimes like
pouing | amore-than-a twenty- four +hour fast..food service, laundromat, youth
hostel. = : arene

My. concern: this morning is not. with the-particular-dynamics: of
parenting and child: raising: and the. prospects forthe family..- Rathér.-my
concern is the concern of the Fifth: Commandment: how the-whole.culture®:
honors: or. dishonors. — the parents of the culture: the- velder ly.

Who-are we talking about? Acknowledging that aging. is something that
happens”-to other people, let-us begin. by. acknowledging ithat. 11.7% ‘of ctr.)
population. is over 65. © That's 27.4 million people andthe mimber is”
growing: twice as. fastvas-.the population at: larges.. When the "Baby. Boomers"
hit.65:° there will be’ 65 million older Americans: ee ena

‘contrary to popular perception, 5% of those’ older persons Jive vin
institutions: : - vis

31% of them-live alone, -
32%: Live:invcenter- “of: cities,
22% are: poor.or near poor.

The impersonal statistics become very real in the prototype: 75,
alone; 500 miles from: the ¢€losest relative, -makingsit. financially: = but
barely, living in fear of the next rent. incteasc,. fear of debilitating.
illness, fear: of medical -bills,: wanting. to be independent: -- but knowing
that the worst case scenario. is more sand more :a- possibility. --i.e., -:
health disaster... money pone... noe where to go.u0,°to say nothing: of urban
crime and the ever present fear of aloneness, of being forgetten.. “Io used
to be afraid of dying" they say. “Now. ['m afraid of living."

The..culture has: forgotten. ©. The culture either doesn't want toor
doesn't. know-how’ to honor its parents. — We have: become. convinced. that.these
matters are.all] private, that-there are no public issues here, that. if: we
simply. pump up the economy-and encourage everyone: to. save fora rainy. day,
it will turn-out. allright... Well it doesn'te::Tt never did) much: -/and- now
it: is .a.national disgrace: ; eae

At the new pereonceptva) devel the culdéare-is obsessed with

oo

youthfulness and inclined to regard aging as wearing down and wearing out,
a process so unpleasant that we are better off ignoring it and pretending
as if it does not exist, or nervously laughing at it.

Think, for instance, of the demeaning stereotypes of aging which
television continues to exploit for a few cheap laughs. Professor Sittler,
in an essay on aging - a topic in which he has experience and wisdom -
observes... "The fact that human life has a limit is te the technically
informed culture of the West, an awkward fact. Popular culture is invited
to-assume that knowledge; resolution, time and. money can solve all
problems.” [Grace & Gravity, p. 121] It can't, of course. Aging is not
a problem to be fixed, solved or disguised. Aving is the human condition.
lt is whal_we do. To become an older person is God's intents God's will,
Gots plan. . [It is the goai, the object. of. the enterprise. ‘itis what we
are-about.

The culprit in this matter, many think, is mandatory retirement,
retirement at 65 which implicitly conveys a judgment about the value or
non-value of people. You know, of course, or if you don't know you should,
that retirement @€ 65 Was not the result of anyone's gerontological
research. Rather fas Otto von Bismark's arbitrary economic ‘decision,
made-to save Germany money. 65 is when most people died in the last
century and so Bismark reasoned, if 65 was the retirement age, Germany's
social-security system would remain solvent.

In any event, we do have a way of assuming that at 65 you cought: to
stop doing what you've been doing, move aside and let someone else do it,
even-if it means there is: nothing worthwhile for you to do, which is
precisely what it does mean for most people. About ten years ago I was a
member of a Presbytery Committee, part of whose job it was to think about
and support the retired ministers. We had a lot of them. We got the idea
that we'd form a committee and have them do something. We asked four of
them to get together and write a paper for the Presbytery called "The
Theology of Retirement." They were a distinguished group. During their
careers they had worked as a Synod Executive, a missionary to China, a
raMmpus pastor, and parish pastor... four vigorous, charming men — ali of
whom were good friends of mine.

They produced u very salty document. J] think the first thing they
discovered when they got together was that they were angry. So they
scolded us. They challenged the very notion of a "theology of retirement."
In fact they said it was an alien concept, a contradiction in terms. There
is no divine mandate here, they told us. Don't attribute to God any notion
of -retirement.

Christian theology, they wrote, sees life as an unbroken continuum
from birth to death. Defiantly they said, "As long as life and health are
given to us there cannot be a Christian theology of retirement."

"Senility" they suggested, "is simply a self-fulfilling prephecy.”
And in their best flourish they wrote, "We do not lose our capacities
because of age but because of disuse. There is truth in the statement that
we do not grow old bul rather that when we cease to prow we become old.

9-17-87

We need a new theology - or perhaps an old-theclogy, reshaped for
this world. Life is a blessed continuum, from beginning to end... We need
to think-anew - to convert our thinking in-light*of our faith. Aging -is
not wearing out... it is maturing, growing. At the level of
conceptualization, we need to see colder people differently... Boo whenever
a comedian exploits aging for a cheap laugh... and cheer for Judd Hirsch's
wonderful portrayal of a passionately and impossibly alive old man in “I'm
Not. Rappaport.’

Be informed by an image of aving contrary.to the cultural idicgm-of
wearing out and wearing down... Hear poetry like ‘this... which suggests.
another way of seeing older people - and the process of aging which is
happening to you... Ee a as co vee

“Tt ‘ought to be lovely to be ‘old
to be full of the peace that comes from experience
and wrinkled ripe fulfillment...

Soothing, old people should be, like apples
when. one is tired of: love: ~
Fragrant. like yellowing leaves, and dim with
the soft stillness and satisfaction of: atitumn.

And a girl should say:

Ut must -be- wonderful to live and grow old. ;
Look’ at- my mother; how rich and*still she “is!-
And a young man should think:

By jove, my father has. faced all weathers,

But it's been a lifei"

That's’ D. Ib. Lawrence ~ Beautiful Old Age.

We need to think anew. “And we, we Christians particularly, need to
be informed by our own tradition of honoring and caring for our elderly.

There are justice issues here. . We need to agitate for this
wonderfully. productive and compassionate system-to find away to meet the
health-care needs of its elderly...

There “is a mission mandate as well. We git in the middle of aii.
enormous concentration of aging people, ‘who are independent, want to-reniain
independent and who, with a little help, can remain independent. Our own
senbior Center, at this moment, is making new and.exciling plans - to put
the Fifth Commandment inte action...

We need to think anew and.act anew. | And we need to listen,

carefully... Maggie Kuhn ~- advocate for elderly persons and founder~ of. the
Grey Panthers, says it beautifully. “We are not ‘senior citizens,’ or
‘golden agers.' We are the elders,’ the experienced ones; we are. maturing,

growing adults responsible for’the survival of our society. We are not
wrinkled°babies {in glorified playpens), succumbing to trivial purposeless
waste of-our years and our time." [Maggie Kuhn on Aging, p. 14]

ua

Think. of what the elders, the experienced ones: have. done.
At. 100. Grandma Muses was still painting.

At 9

4 Bertrand Russell was organizing peace marches
AL. 93 Bernard Shaw wrote “Parfetched Bables."

At 90 Picasso was producing drawings. _

At..89 Schweitzer owas doctor ing.

At 88 Michelangelo designed a church.

At 82 Churchill wrote his four volume History of the English Speaking
Peoples.

At. 8] Benjamin Franklin made a speech and affected the compromise
that led to the adoption of the Constitution of the United States of
America. {See Hoover Rupert. in Outlook, 9/14/81]

How poor this world would be without the products of life lived on
that full and blessed continuum from birth to death.

Martin Marty reported a University of California study which showed
that “the person most likely.to be working: for humanitarian causes and
world peace today isn't a young college student. [t's your grandmother.
The most politically active people in the United States are grandmothers."
[Jim Aylward, Leaders, in Context, 3/15/79}. :

TI speak now personally to you... who are our elders, our experienced
ones. This culture needs you. You have a sense of history the rest of us
can't have yet. You have seen mare and lived through more great events
than any generation before you. You witnessed what people my. age and
younger only read about. . And don't tell us that your memory is slipping,
by the way. That's another self-fulfilling stereotype. You do have much
more to remember... But, as a malter of fact, because your educution relied
much more heavily on memorization, you can remember more and better than
most of us. A Michigan neurolovist tried that thesis. lle asked fifty
people in their 80's and 90's to memorize a section of the Congressional
Record. Then he. asked fifly college people to. memorize the same material.
Without exception the people iu their 80's and 90's memorized more swiftly
and with greater ease than their younger counterparts. And their recall
was more accurate over a longer period of.time. Seleetive recall]?
Perhaps. Remembering what you want to remember and forgetling the rest?
Maybe. But your memory isn't going bad at. alli

Erik Evikson said that.old age is "a time of. integrity. of absolute
honesty.” [Kulm, op. cit., p. 14} We need that. 1 was delighted to
encounter again the much quoted vignette about Artur Rubenstein... Someone
told him, when he was 80, that he was playing better than ever. fie said,
"E think. so.: Now T can take chances I never took befure. You see the

stakes are not seo hiph. 1 can afferd it. J used to be soa much more
careful. No wrong uotes. Not too bold ideas. Now Po let go and enjoy
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myself and to hell with everything but the music."

We need that too, that gathering up, that sense of what is important
and what is unimportant, thal integrity.

T thank God for my mentors, the experienced ones...

For Amelia Henry who, at-104, was cooking for her. 75 year old ‘son,
and who, when her ministers pleaded with her to see a doctor ~- at least for
a physical, used to say, “Oh yes, a lot of my friends used to go to doctors.
They're all dead now."

And for Professor Sittler whe, in his 80's,;:néarly blind; is: read: to
every day, and who not Jong ago traveled. from Hyde Park to Chestnut: and
Michigan by bus.

And for Jean Wilson, who missed her beloved Belfast and used te
regale me and enrich my life with stories of watching the Titanic slip -her
moors for her maiden voyage.

And for Mr. Anstaett, who when his nurses and sons could no longer
allow him on the golf course, used to stand on his lawn with a ciub in his
hand, and play 18 holes, without walking a step.

And for Carrie Stevens, a member of the parish, who died last: week at
107 and who played the piano every day of her life and would favor the
visiting ministers with “You Are My Sunshine.”

I thank God for that - and for the faith to which it points. - Because
in terms of perspective and faith - age does seem to know something youth
is only in the process of learning: namely that aging is or can be
growing: that the God who gave life, continues to nurture and sustain
life, like.a loving parent, and thet there is nothing in life which will
separate us from God; that the final enemy is actually not an enemy at all,
and that. the accumulated years are not a burden to be wearily born but a
crown to wear with pride and dignity.

So, if is time to say-out Toud what all of us know in our hearts —
that when needs are added up; older peaple need yvaunger people, but perhaps
i Ri & i i

not neariy as much as younger people need older people: that a whole. God
planned; youth shows but half... that there is deep truth and importance

to Che aneient injunetion, “Honor your mother and your father that your
days may be. long on the land which the Lord your God has viven you."

We need one another. Gad planned it thal way. Phe best is yet to
be. Thanks be to God.

Praise: to you, Lard God,
for the- blessed coutinuum of fife.

Praise to you, Creator Gort,
for the miracle of life.

Praise to you. Pravidenlial Gud,

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9-17-87

nurturer and care~-taker - for your wisdom. expressed in the maturing,
growing, aging process of life...

Praise to you, Almighty God, for your
great love to us and your presence with us in all our days.

Through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

“ny

3-17-87