Aging: the Fulfillment of Life (Nouwen and Gaffney) Book Summary

In our life as a wagon wheel, each spoke is of equal importance, whether of childhood, adulthood, or old age. If we can remove the defensive distinctions between young and old, all of us can then grow while sharing the common burdens of aging. While we do not know when our wheel of life will finish its full turn, it is not a return to old ground, but one step forward in our salvation. Jesus’ wheel stopped after He seemingly had lost everything. Yet He knew He had aged enough — “It is fulfilled.” He then becomes the sign of hope and new life for others to bear their own aging patiently.

Aging leads to darkness if 'being' is considered less important than 'doing:' “Property, power, and prestige become hard to relinquish; even volunteerism becomes second-rate; 'I am who I was.'” Self-rejection (stripping away of self-worth), segregation (rejection by society), and desolation (rejection by friends) all lead to the darkness of isolation. Loneliness imprisons with guilt, anxiety, despair and depression, bitterness and cynicism, and worst of all – hopelessness.

Conversely, aging can be a way to the light. “The value of an old gnarled tree is the tree itself, protected from being axed because of its uselessness, free to grow into the light.” Growth, with open-ended hope and humour, comes full of possibilities instead of expectations. Death comes not as a morbid intruder, but a gentle reminder of the contingency of things. We can then live in the present, detached from preoccupation with the past or fear of the future.

Rembrandt’s many self-portraits remind us to likewise constantly repaint our own portraits as a mirror for our own vulnerable selves. We cannot care for others if we hide from our own emerging aging selves. Until that self is a welcomed friend dwelling at ease within us, we are not “at home” in our own house. Instead of an open room, our heart becomes a cluttered room full of worries and concerns, with no place for the people for whom we care.

Caring leads others to light, by listening. Our presence is not just to be nice and friendly, to be visiting or offering gifts or other services. Our suggestions and good words may actually foster distance rather than allow closeness. Others need to be heard rather than distracted, to be sustained and not entertained, to be restored with a sense of self-worth with eyes of compassion. Compassion sees beauty in the midst of misery; it brings hope in the center of pain. A “dying” life is not an absurdity of life, but a gentle reminder of a grain that can yield a rich harvest (John 12:24).

Beyond looking at his own brokenness through his self-portraits, Rembrandt confronts people to examine their own illusions of immortality with his paintings. By helping each other find our commonality of mortality, a community of solidarity will change darkness to come into light.