Invest or Divest ??

The boomers who are finishing their first careers are the most educated, have more wealth and have contributed more to making a difference than any other generation in the history of mankind. Their desire to make a difference has, for many, not diminished.

The “Seasoned Believers” among the boomer generation face a dilemma. The church, by and large, has failed to recognize the boomer wave that is approaching and has not re-tooled to receive them.

Society (including the Churched ( ed. note) does not yet know how to engage 77 million people in rebuilding social capital over a 15- or 20-year span of later adulthood. The demographic phenomenon that makes this vision possible is much too recent for society to have adapted, resulting in what sociologists call “structural lag” (Moen 2003).

It is not simply a question of revamping existing institutions to absorb the boomers when they come. Nor is it only about keeping boomers busy, doing something that interests them in a way that has some marginal social value. Creating the infrastructure that will support and sustain the kind of vision that has been described may require creating new institutions, transforming existing ones,(Cobb and Johnson 2003; Johnson et al. 2004)

Unless the Church changes the current paradigm, we will fail to utilize the life experiences, the talents and the dreams of some 374,000 local “unchurched” boomers.

We had better begin the changes now to allow the Boomer generation, already in the church, to find the “good work which God has prepared for them”. They will not allow themselves to be relegated to sitting on the “shelf”. We are to purposely represent God in our communities.

Will we invest in them or will we divest ourselves of the Boomer Generation??