Sunday Reflections: How Are You Preparing for Your Retirement Years?

By Rev. Dai Morgan

They say that as a person grows older, time appears to pass faster. That is certainly true in my case. Events of 30 years ago do not seem, to me, to have occurred that long in the past. I wonder how it can be that so much of my life has passed so quickly.

From my perspective, there is a message here for folks under the age of 30—life goes by before you know it. There are probably many lessons that can be derived from this little nugget of wisdom. However, the point that I want to make, today, is that preparing for the future will reap benefits, even if the effort and cost appear to have no immediate payoff. 

One obvious conclusion from this observation is that everyone should be planning for retirement. It’s never too early. Any financial advisor will tell you to start saving and investing as soon as possible in life. The longer the length of time the greater will be the rewards of compound interest.

However, financial planning is not the only kind of preparation that will pay off, down the line. It appears that spiritual investment is also very important to a happy retirement.

The Association for the Sociology of Religion at its annual meeting in Denver, last August, revealed the following findings:

• Participation in the life of a religious body and attendance at religious services can help safeguard senior adults from loneliness. Researchers Sunshine Rote and Terrence Hill of Florida State University and Christopher Ellison of the University of Texas at San Antonio analyzed data from the National Social Life, Health and Aging Project. They found involvement in religious institutions to be an important support for older adults.  

• Data from the Religion, Aging and Health Surveys (2001 and 2004 surveys of adults over the age of 65) indicate that listening to religious music can be associated with increases in life satisfaction, a greater sense of control and a decrease in anxiety.

• Data from a Health and Retirement Study indicated that senior adults with long-term religious experience showed positive life satisfaction, lower levels of depression and higher than average resilience to trauma.

It can be argued that a strong spiritual life tends to reinforce coping abilities. Religious faith for senior adults provides a sense of comfort and a bulwark against adversity. Researcher Lydia Manning of the Duke University Center for the Study of Aging and Human Development observed, “I think it’s incredibly important to take into account religion and spirituality in older populations."

However, the benefits of religious faith in old age are not something created in the short-term. They appear to be the result of maturity, accrued over time. In her study of religion, quality of life, depression and trauma, Manning found that those senior adults who had only a short period of religious involvement did not experience the same degree of positive influence as the long-term faithful.

Manning discovered that continuity plays an integral role in the deep faith that allows many individuals to cope with the effects of aging. Many of the people she interviewed spoke of their relationship with God as a concrete relationship, “Almost as if they would talk about their spouse or a best friend,” she said.

It seems that the recommendation of financial advisors to begin saving early for a secure retirement can be applied to religious faith. If you are still young you can lay a foundation for your security in later life—take my word for it, the years pass before you know it. Investing money in an IRA can have its benefits, but so can investing your heart and mind in religious faith. Seek a church in which to become involved. You can never start too early.

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