The Aging Kingdom, a Conference Proposal
Introduction
Christianity is not the world’s oldest religion; however, it is the largest one, which provides guidance to millions of people in all parts of the modern world. The great impact of this faith is due to its basic, inherent humanism of the great and profound meaning of the message that God sacrificed His own Son to save people from their sins and grant them the everlasting life and salvation. The fact that Christianity has the largest, compared to other major world religions, number of believers means that Christian Churches should be up to the challenges of being the guide and assistant to people in the complex and often controversial environment of the modern world. To measure up to exacting standards of forming the foundation of the people’s worldview and the providing guidance and unity with God throughout people’s life the church should be able to develop the faith, its tenets and principles.
As any other religion, Christianity should be ready to provide answers to various issues and problems that people are seeking today. Only such an approach is capable of making the faith alive, non-dogmatic, and effective in its mission. Moreover, such an attitude is in line with the mission of Christianity as laid down at the dawn of Christianity by Christ himself, and then His Apostles and disciples. Today, the great missionary work of the Christian Church is continued by different churches and ministries throughout the world. Fuller Theological Seminary as the most influential Christian seminary in America considers its duty and obligation to focus on Fuller Theological Seminary’s principles of pastor education and social networking by developing new approaches and integrating Christian teaching with challenges and issues of the contemporary life. This paper will present an outline and suggested the format for a national conference to address the need for clergy to have more training in the area of Gerontology and Theology. Attendees would be Clergy, Seminary Students, and Scholars, with the presentation made by Fuller Seminary and an active participation of all the Christian Churches and communities welcomed and appreciated.
The Role of Theology in Addressing the Issues of Gerontology
The Christian Church’s mission of helping people and finding their connection with God is manifold and has many different and challenging issues to address. Understanding the church and its major mission as the developing the dynamic, living, non-dogmatic faith. It means that Christianity needs to explore different social, demographic, and other matters, all those that are relevant to people and society and respond to them in the appropriate ways. Pastoral activities and programs should be also developed and structured in the manner that ensures strong ministry in different areas and addressing different groups of the population. Special programs should be developed by Christian Churches for different social, ethnic, professional, and demographic groups of the population. Among these, an aging population is a group with some special needs, which should be considered to the new and rapidly developing demographic factors and trends. Therefore, …
