Leeds Homeshare is a scheme that aims to prove the opening words of Psalm 133 to be true.
The scheme carefully matches an older person, who might need some help to live independently in their own home, with someone who has a housing need. In return for providing low cost accommodation, the older person gets a minimum of 10 hours of help with daily living tasks like cleaning, shopping, gardening or walking the dog.
But it’s really about companionship, about living with someone in unity and, as the Psalm says, it can be so ‘good and pleasant’. It can help older people stay independent and in their own home for longer and offers companionship and new relationships for both the homeowner and the homesharer.
It’s a safe and supported arrangement, with Shared Lives in Adult Social Care taking references, checks and assessments to help ensure risk and safeguarding issues are well managed.
If you have a spare room and would be interested in having a chat about this, with no obligations, then please call Cath Ormerod on 0113 378 5410 or email homeshare@leeds.gov.uk. More details can be found here Homeowner leaflet .
The period before Christmas can be a particularly busy one. Here at Growing Old Grace-fully we too have been swept up in the busyness as we have been developing a pack of ideas for and from parishes to help in “Welcoming Older People” which we are hoping to launch early in 2017.
We want this pack of ideas to inspire practical actions that support the growth of later life friendly parishes in our own Diocese of Leeds, as well as beyond our Diocese. It is our hope and our prayer that this pack really makes a positive difference when it comes to support older people and valuing their gifts. Every topic we consider focuses on “What your parish can do” in a variety of areas including:
Vocation in Later Life
Growing a Dementia-Friendly Parish
Being Mortal
Tackling Loneliness
Caring for Carers.
We are so grateful to have been given a generous donation towards the production of this pack by The Grail Society. This means we can get the pack designed and laid out to make it easy to use. We aim to have printed packs available by Spring 2017, and we hope the 8 Chapters will be available even earlier for downloading on our website. We will make sure we let you know when they are ready, as well as how to get your copy.
In last year’s Christmas Newsletter, we included an excerpt from a talk by John Bell of the Iona Community who made the surprising statement that “Advent and Christmas are about old people”.
Last Christmas Day, on Radio 4’s “Thought for the Day”, John developed this idea in more detail. He spoke about preaching at midnight mass in Dundee when he asked the congregation:
“I wonder who among us was once a shepherd? I wonder who among us was once a wise man? There was an outburst of laughter when I asked who had once been the hind legs of the donkey.”
John continues:
“For many people, their introduction to the Christmas story will have been through taking part as a child in a school or church nativity play. Maybe this explains the origin of the phrase, ‘Christmas is a time for the children.’
The irony of it all is that there are no children with leading roles in the Christmas story. Jesus was not born in a kindergarten surrounded by infants wearing their father’s dressing gown or their mother’s tea towels.
Most of the main players are old – Elizabeth, Zechariah, Simeon and Anna have their elderly status clearly underscored in the Bible. The Shepherds would not be toddlers; and the wise men wouldn’t be wise unless they were old. In those days wisdom did not come through attaining a Ph.D in your mid-twenties.
The Christmas story is, rather, about God expecting older people to enable a new and surprising thing to happen.
I saw this truth alive and well last week when I visited a Roman Catholic church hall which has become the welcome centre for Syrian refugees. Most of those helping out were retired. None had experience of relating to Arabic speaking Muslims before. But like the people in the nativity story they felt somehow summoned to welcome and enable a new thing to happen.
So if you once were a shepherd or an angel or even the hind legs of the donkey, don’t let Christmas simply be a time for regression therapy…..particularly when now as always, God is looking for older people to be the midwives of the new things that need to happen.”
John Bell, Christmas Day 2015, Radio 4
Warmest thanks for your interest in and support of our work across the Diocese.
We wish all Growing Old Grace-fully’s friends and supporters God’s richest blessings for Christmas and the coming year.
Pippa Bonner, Trustee Carol Burns, Chair Anne Forbes, Trustee
Paul Grafton, Trustee Cath Mahoney, Trustee Mgr Peter Rosser, Trustee
This week, 31st October-6th November, is Trustee’s Week and I want to say a massive
THANK YOU
to all our trustees for their enthusiasm and commitment, as well as the skills and wisdom they have brought to direct Growing Old Grace-fully‘s work in the Diocese.
Paul, Ann, Anne, Carol, Pippa, Cath and Fr Peter are all volunteers and all bring different skills and experience to the role, but they all share a desire to support parishes in welcoming older people. http://www.growingoldgracefully.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/Meet-The-Management-Committee.pdf
If you also believe we should cherish the blessings of age and think parishes need more support to help value the gifts of older people, then I would love to talk to you. We are looking for Trustees to help make a difference at an exciting time as we develop new ideas and deliver new projects. The role would require about 4 hours a month of your time.
For more information please email me at growing.old.gracefully@dioceseofleeds.org.uk or call me on 07702 255142.
Growing Old Grace-fully were so pleased to be invited to an event at Leeds Irish Centre by Leeds Irish Health & Homes, to hear the findings of some recent research into memory loss and the needs of the Irish community.
One of the findings of this research that struck home with me was the importance of being with people who understand our culture when we are living with dementia; people who speak our language either literally or figuratively speaking. A friend told me that dementia took away her Polish-born mum’s ability to speak English, even though she was a fluent English speaker for 50 years, but her mum could still speak Polish.
Being with people who understand our culture is part of feeling we belong. It’s why we need to work hard to ensure that people who have been part of the parish life do not feel excluded if they develop dementia. Please think about whether your parish could run a short session on Becoming a Dementia-Friendly Parish which Growing Old Grace-fully would be delighted to run.
Mary Mother of God, Bradford, are now the 5th Parish in our Diocese to start the process of becoming a recognised ‘dementia-friendly Parish’.
Thank you to everyone who attended ‘Becoming a Dementia-Friendly Parish’ session on Tuesday 20th September. Growing Old Grace-fully was given such a warm welcome, which started with evening mass. 17 people each became a Dementia Friend, including two people from the local community who are not parishioners.
We discovered that many of us know people with dementia, or we may be living with the disease ourselves. It was a privilege to share our stories and, in this sharing, remove some of the fear and stigma around dementia. Being a dementia-friendly parish offers an opportunity to reach out to those who are most vulnerable and voiceless in society and to show the love of God in action.
St Joseph’s, Wetherby are now the 4th Parish in our Diocese to start the process of becoming a recognised ‘dementia-friendly Parish’.
Thank you to all the people who attended ‘Becoming a Dementia-Friendly Parish’ session on Monday 18th July. Growing Old Grace-fully was given such a warm welcome on a very warm evening, and 15 people each became a Dementia Friend.
A dementia-friendly Parish is one where people with dementia are understood, respected and supported and are confident they can contribute to Parish life.
Earlier the same day, Growing Old Grace-fully received our Award from Bradford & District Dementia Action Alliance (DAA), in recognition of our work. Here’s Trustee Ann West receiving our Certificate from Chris North of Bradford DAA.
Would you like you like your Parish to think about growing in dementia-friendliness? Please email Rachel at growing.old.gracefully@dioceseofleeds.org.uk or call 07702 255142 to book your session or find out more.
As we send out our latest GOG news to you we are in the 10th week of Ordinary Time. (The definition of the word Ordinary in this context comes from the Latin word Ordo which means order, and the weeks of Ordinary Time are numbered rather than given specific names.) The Roman Catholic Church and many others define Ordinary Time as all the time outside Advent, Christmas, Lent and Easter. It comprises 33-34 weeks of the 52 week year, so is actually most of our lives!
We are perhaps back into our routine, after the lows of Lent and the highs of Easter and Pentecost. Most of us spend our daily lives in more middling rhythms and ordinary routines. Writers like Joan Chittister and Margaret Silf write about Ordinary Time emphasising that we can find God in all things and in everyone. This may be difficult if we feel isolated, are currently anxious about our lives, if we or others are ill, or are grieving someone close to us. As we grow older bereavement and illness may be more evident in our daily lives.
However: so is our experience evident, (if not to ourselves, to others), and the wisdom gained from it. Perhaps we have time to notice the small as well as the big things. In no particular order: we may appreciate more the abundant nature around us as it transforms from spring to summer colours, a sunset, a lovely building, the families and children around us (whether we have our own children or not) who are becoming older. We may remember them as babies and now see what they are doing! We may have time to stop and chat, to “sit and stare”, to encourage others, to watch our favourite TV programme, to give and receive everyday support and kindnesses and to appreciate quietly the work of those around us. We are all still working (even if it is not paid work) in our homes, parishes, volunteering in our communities, thinking about the wider world, donating time and money, signing petitions, voting, smiling and talking to others we see every day. If we cannot get out much we can approach the challenges of daily life of getting through the living of the day as work. We can all think and pray about those around us. St Therese of Lisieux wrote about doing small things well, with great love for God and others. In many ways older people can be the binding glue in their community’s daily lives, just as Ordinary Time is the important binding glue in the daily life of the Church’s liturgical year.
So, in our ordinary everyday lives, we never know how significant are our daily tasks and prayers for others. Recently I noticed a person who seemingly cannot hear, move or remember very much these days. She sits and prays most of the time and has the most wonderful smile. Everyone notices her and feels her warmth and encouragement. Daniel O’Leary says “When we see the presence of God in our most ordinary, daily routines, and in the darkness we often experience, then our lives are transformed.” God is in that smile!
This week is The Alzheimer’s Society Dementia Awareness Week (15th – 20th May), and this year’s focus is to encourage anyone who is worried about dementia to confront their concerns and get in touch.
If you’re worried that you, or someone close to you, might have dementia, the National Dementia Helpline is there to offer advice and support on 0300 222 1122 or email helpline@alzheimers.org.uk.
Here at Growing Old Grace-fully we wanted to write our own messages to Dementia, and help us show people who are worried that they’re not alone.
There are lots of events happening this week so here’s a link to the Yorkshire events: https://www.alzheimers.org.uk/site/scripts/events.php?categoryID=200223 and we are running a short one hour session on ‘Becoming a Dementia-Friendly Parish’ this week on Wednesday 18th May at Corpus Christi, Neville Road, Leeds LS9 0HD at 7.00pm – 8.00pm.
It is easy to assume our parishes are automatically dementia-friendly. How could we who aspire to follow Jesus think it is acceptable to exclude anyone? Yet often people with dementia, and their families, do have that experience of feeling marginalised. To be a dementia-friendly parish is to find ways to include people with dementia, so that they are helped to experience life in all its fullness and they know they are not alone.
If you would like to discuss how Growing Old Grace-fully might help support older people in your parish then please visit our contact page here and get in touch.
The scheme carefully matches an older person, who might need some help to live independently in their own home, with someone who has a housing need. In return for providing low cost accommodation, the older person gets a minimum of 10 hours of help with daily living tasks like cleaning, shopping, gardening or walking the dog.
