Come of Age

Stephen Jenkinson continues to revolutionize aging and dying in a book that analyzes the crisis confronting those searching for elders in a society where older people are dismissed as irrelevant and familial roles provide inadequate models of wisdom and experience

Following the success of his previous book Die Wise, Stephen Jenkinson explores our fear of death, our search for sources of wisdom, and the inadequate roles that our culture--and Christianity in particular--has cast for each of us in this wide-ranging discussion of what it means to be an elder in our society. We have plenty of senior citizens, Jenkinson claims. We are not short on parents or grandparents. Yet we lack true elders--individuals younger people can look to for guidance and wisdom. Taking on the sacred cow of the family, Jenkinson argues that elderhood is a function rather than an identity. It is not a position earned simply by the number of years on the planet or the title "parent" or "grandparent." As young people in our culture struggle with the damaged world left to them by older generations, this message is crucial and Jenkinson''s analysis advances the discussion by interrogating our essential capacity to identify and nurture elders.