"How Can Seniors Stay Connected to Their Spiritual Needs as They Age?"

Aligning spirituality with lifestyle changes.

Everyone has a right to practice, join, and form religious practices according to the constitution of South Africa. Many people are part of some religion or practices African tradition.  

Senior citizens who are staying at old age homes or hospices are finding it difficult to maintain their spiritual needs, this can be from different reasons like that the church is far from the facilities and that it can affect the routine of the senior citizens.   

Online sermons. 

Covid 19 pandemic gave way to new ways of doing through technology. Zoom meetings and Microsoft Teams are making it easy to connect with other people remotely. Many churches have adapted to the integration of technology. They preach and teach through those platforms. At TLC we have some elderly who would request the caregivers to connect to their churches.  

Visiting the facility  

It is so heart-warming to see a familiar face, most of the senior citizens who stay at old age homes and hospice can take a long time without seeing their church members. They feel loved and important when they see their pastors and congregation members visiting them. Some churches around Hammanskraal make it a norm to visit their church member occasionally just to offer the gospel and to pray to getter.   

Attending special events 

Special occasions such as Easter, Ramadan, and Diwali are important yearly celebrations of different religions. Every church member gets to participate and be joyous, it can be easy and more enjoyable when you are at the location. Church representatives and family should constantly take their senior citizens to these events. At TLC Old Age Home, we encourage the families of our senior citizens to do just that. 

Daily prayers. 

Prayer is important every day, it is one of the routines that is happening at TLC old age home where workers and the beneficiaries get to sing and pray every morning, it is very beneficial to everyone especially when they feel down or not appreciated. 

Although much can be done to maintain the spiritual connections of our senior citizens, it will take a long time to accommodate different practices of beliefs such as traditional healers. In our centre, we have some beneficiaries who are traditional healers (sangomas)," they had to stop practicing their beliefs activities because they left their equipment at home and to avoid the stigma of being called a witch" says Mrs. Maluleka one of the beneficiaries that stay at TLC. It affects them negatively because they feel excluded and not important.