Pastoral Psychol (2011) 60:95–98 DOI 10.1007/s11089-010-0307-6

Spiritual Autobiography and Older Adults Mary Clark Moschella

Published online: 28 July 2010 # Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2010

Abstract Spiritual autobiography groups constitute a form of ministry that can potentially enrich the lives of older adults, their families, and their congregations. Such groups, when competently led, provide participants with an environment in which they can make meaning out of their lives, grieve their losses, and give and receive support. The actions and interactions involved in composing, telling, and hearing life stories are salutary exercises that can increase participants’ experiences of clarity, coherence, and connection to God and to each other. The spiritual wisdom that emerges from such life stories, when shared within congregations, can enhance intergenerational relationships and lead to spiritual growth for members of diverse ages. Keywords Spiritual . Autobiography . Story . Listening . Older adults

Introduction For the last 30 years, William M. Clements has pointed the way toward pastoral understanding and care for the needs of older adults. As one of his former graduate students, it is a joy to participate in this forum that both honors Bill and seeks to continue the important work that he initiated in the field of pastoral theology and care. In particular, this essay lifts up and builds upon Bill Clements’ insights into the use of spiritual autobiography as a form of pastoral care for older adults. In 1998 I was privileged to serve on a team of teaching assistants to Bill Clements in his famous course on “Spiritual Autobiography in Pastoral Care and Counseling” at Claremont School of Theology. In this course students of diverse ages practiced writing and telling their own life stories, for the sake of their spiritual formation and growth and in order to prepare them to lead such groups in their future ministries. My work with the students and the literature Bill introduced in this class turned out to be formative for me as well, both as a teacher and as a scholar. The wisdom that has endured for me is this: that the process of M. C. Moschella (*) Yale Divinity School, 409 Prospect Street, New Haven, CT 06511, USA e-mail: [email protected]

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composing one’s spiritual autobiography is often a life-giving activity; and that the telling or sharing of this story with others in a faith community can be particularly salutary, especially for older adults. As diarists, therapists and pastors know, the act of writing or telling one’s story is a brave and daring endeavor. It involves naming one’s own reality, calling it something, just as God called “worlds into being” (UCC 1995, p. 885) in the creation story and then invited Adam (humanity) to name the animals, one by one. Naming the events and moments of one’s life and then weaving them together in some coherent fashion is in fact an act of creation, or co-creation of that story and that on-going life. For some individuals, it takes courage to come to voice, to claim the power to speak, to believe that one’s story matters enough to be told. In a society like the US that tends to devalue older adults, particularly older women (Scheib 2004), pastors and care-givers need to be aware of just how difficult a task it may be for older adults to undertake such a project. Those older adults who think of themselves as ordinary or unremarkable may need encouragement in order to “come to terms,” to find the words with which to describe their lives. When an older adult takes the action of telling or writing his or her story, a sense of strength or clarity may ensue. The very act of composing one’s own story is an exercise of freedom that holds the potential to empower and enliven the author—to confer a measure of “author-ity” upon him or her (Moschella 2008, pp. 237–9). For example, a diarist who is satisfied with her own scrawling, whether because it is artful or because it expresses something of her self, finds that she gathers strength to face the day. Pastors and caregivers who embrace the goals of liberation and empowerment (Miller-McLemore 1999, p. 80) know that merely offering to listen can be a gift of grace to an elder who feels unworthy or fears “wasting your time.” If the story that is shared is received or heard in a thoughtful and respectful manner, the person’s feeling of clarity and well being will likely be magnified. There is a blessed relief that comes from feeling understood, known, by another. Bill Clements’ teaching helped to demonstrate the ways in which the benefits of telling one’s story can be multiplied in the context of spiritually focused small groups in the church. In a group of this sort, the members take turns telling and hearing each other’s life stories. Both the speaking and the listening are potentially enriching activities. In speaking to a group whose members share something in common, such as age or faith or widowhood, storytellers can experience empathic listening. In listening to their peers’ stories, group members often recognize themes and subplots that are familiar to them, as well as differences and unusual details that they find interesting or funny or touching. Sensitive group leadership can help promote both this sense of mutual recognition of shared stories as well as curiosity and respect for individual differences. Belonging to such a group can be calming and affirming as persons discover that their lives and their emotions are coherent and recognizable to others. Belonging to such a group can also be empowering in that members hear new stories and thus enlarge the range of possible interpretations of and actions in their own lives.

Older adults and spirituality The ministry of spiritual autobiography groups can be particularly beneficial for older adults. In late middle age and beyond, the developmental task of coming to terms with one’s life story becomes compelling. Even in a postmodern world, most Westerners long for a sense of coherence, unity, and purpose (McAdams 1996, pp. 135–6). There is a desire to know that one matters, and to believe that there will be some kind of legacy that lives on in

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the lives of subsequent generations (McAdams 1996, p. 143). As Mary Pipher (1999) puts it, “Old age, especially in the last hard years, is really a search for a place in the universe, both figuratively and literally. The old look for their existential place. They ask, ‘How did my life matter?’ ‘Was my time well spent?’ ‘What did I mean to others?’ . . .” (p. 15). The task of making meaning out of the life one has lived becomes more urgent as one realizes more fully that this life will come to an end. This work of meaning making is always a spiritual task, whether or not authors use explicitly theological language. According to Ann Ulanov (1989): Aging brings home to us what we have done or failed to do with our lives, our creativity or our waste, our openness to or zealous hiding from what really matters. Precisely at that point, age cracks us open, sometimes for the first time, makes us aware of the center, makes us look for it and for relation to it. (p. 122) Aging forces the questions of meaning and purpose. As the losses of old age pile up—lost homes, lost jobs, lost friends and loved ones, lost health and vigor—and the “cracking open” process progresses, older adults need to do the work of grieving and healing, revising their stories and thus re-weaving the fabric of their faith and their lives. A well-led spiritual autobiography group can provide older adults with a forum for this poignant and complex work. Such a group can lend support and mutual encouragement to its members. It helps to know and be reassured that the feeling of being “cracked open” is normal and appropriate and shared among group members. It helps to hear stories that reveal how others find ways to cope with the losses and frustration of personal agency. It helps to hear how some manage to embrace confidence in God and in their connection to all that is. Dan McAdams (1996) uses these words to describe the “scripts” of highly generative older adults who manage to stay committed to the goodness in their stories: Things do grow and blossom, even as suggested in the generative metaphors and similes that animate the stories they tell. Some things do get better. There is progress amidst the setbacks and the suffering. And I can make a difference. (p. 147) The benefits of spiritual autobiography for older adults are manifold. The gift of this tender kind of composition can also rebound to future generations and to entire congregations.

Congregational care The wisdom of older adults is often under-recognized and under-utilized in congregational care. While clergy and lay caregivers may recognize a duty to offer care to the elderly, rarely is the idea of ministry with older adults fully embraced or realized. Rarely is the wisdom of age—that comes from enduring the “cracking open” process of which Ulanov wrote—made available to younger generations. Storytelling across the generations is a practice that can open up enormous resources for spiritual growth for congregational members across the life span. The stories that are told in spiritual autobiography groups for older adults can be spoken aloud in worship or in other congregational gatherings. Alternatively, and if the participants consent, their stories can be recorded or written down and preserved for the congregation’s archives. Records of the stories of congregational elders are of great historical value. Beyond this, the sharing of these stories with the congregation can promote interchange and interpersonal connection between members of different generations. This story sharing

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could be the starting point for rich theological conversations through which members reflect upon their values and commitments. The StoryCorps Project—the large oral history project led by National Public Radio and the American Folklife Institute—illustrates well the wisdom of sharing life stories across generations (Isay 2007). Since 2003, well over 10,000 interviews of ordinary Americans have been conducted and recorded, using a few basic questions that help get at the heart of the story. In this project, the interviewer is often a family member. The questions include, among others: “What was the happiest moment of your life? The saddest? Who has been the kindest to you in your life? How would you like to be remembered? Do you have any regrets? Is there anything you’ve never told me but want to tell me now?” (Isay 2007, pp. 283–4). Participants in this project report enormous learning from hearing the stories of members of their own families. The richness of these exchanges can be glimpsed in Dave Isay’s (2007) edited collection of the transcripts, Listening Is an Act of Love. Many of the moving stories and feelings that older adults describe in these interviews were shared with a younger family member for the very first time. If not for the interviews, one wonders, would these stories have been shared at all? The wisdom and learning that emerges from the StoryCorps interviews is instructive for the church. Listening to the life stories of older adults is indeed an act of love, one that can enrich the lives of congregants of all ages. Story listening can reveal the spiritual dimensions of elders’ lives that often go untapped or even unnamed. In addition to asking some of the StoryCorps questions listed above, church members can invite older adults to recall their memories of life in their local congregation, or their experiences of God, or both. Questions that get at issues of values, transcendence, hope, or despair can bring forth the kind of stories that matter most, to both teller and listener. Such stories are worth telling, hearing, and remembering in communities of faith. Older adults have much spiritual care to give as well as to receive in congregations. Spiritual autobiography groups constitute a form of ministry that allows for both experiences. Such groups provide environments in which participants may share both the “cracking open” and the reassembling of the life story. The wisdom of this spiritual work can enliven young and old alike. The writing and teaching of William M. Clements have opened up the richness of spiritual autobiography with older adults to the field of pastoral theology and care. We are grateful indeed.

References Isay, D. (2007). Listening is an act of love: A celebration of American life from the StoryCorps Project. New York: Penguin. McAdams, D. P. (1996). Narrating the self in adulthood. In J. E. Birren, G. M. Kenyon, J. E. Ruth, J. J. F. Schroots, & T. Svensson (Eds.), Aging and biography: Explorations in adult development (pp. 131– 148). New York: Springer. Miller-McLemore, B. J. (1999). Feminist theory in pastoral theology. In B. J. Miller-McLemore & B. L. GillAustern (Eds.), Feminist and womanist pastoral theology (pp. 77–94). Nashville: Abingdon. Moschella, M. C. (2008). Ethnography as a pastoral practice: An introduction. Cleveland: Pilgrim. Pipher, M. (1999). Another country: Navigating the emotional terrain of our elders. New York: Riverhead Books. Scheib, K. J. (2004). Challenging invisibility: Practices of care with older women. St. Louis: Chalice. Ulanov, A. B. (1989). Aging: On the way to one’s end. In W. M. Clements (Ed.), Ministry with the aging: Designs, challenges, foundations (pp. 109–123). Binghamton: Hayworth. United Church of Christ. (1995). United Church of Christ statement of faith in the form of a doxology. In A. G. Clyde (Ed.), The new century hymnal (p. 885). Cleveland: Pilgrim.