{"id":830558,"date":"2024-06-20T05:00:24","date_gmt":"2024-06-20T10:00:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/?p=830558"},"modified":"2024-06-19T16:12:41","modified_gmt":"2024-06-19T21:12:41","slug":"the-coming-silver-tsunami-a-volunteer-crisis-in-aging-congregations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/blog\/the-coming-silver-tsunami-a-volunteer-crisis-in-aging-congregations\/","title":{"rendered":"The Coming Silver Tsunami: A Volunteer Crisis in Aging Congregations"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\t\t<div class=\"content-restriction-preview\"><p>I have a friend who works in the long-term care industry. They operate facilities for older people who need help living independently. Their services range from assisted living, which requires three meals a day and some basic housekeeping services, to full nursing care, which requires round-the-clock support from a highly trained medical staff.<\/p> <p>In our conversation, he used a term that I have been thinking about a lot: the silver tsunami. Tens of millions of Americans will be moving into the last stage of their lives in the next several years, and there just aren\u2019t enough beds and trained staff to meet the rising demands of an aging population.<\/p> <p>The church is facing its own type of silver tsunami right now regarding the kinds of folks who shoulder the volunteer burden of the church. In many small and medium-sized churches, members organize events, generate financial reports, and do essential maintenance<\/p><\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"content-restriction-block\">\n\t\t\t<div class=\"content-restriction-block-login login-toggle\">Already a member? <a href=\"#\">Log in<\/a><\/div>\n\t\t\t<div class=\"content-restriction-block-content\">\n\t\t\t\t<h2>Unlock premium content!<\/h2>\n\t\t\t\t<p>Get access to all Church Answers premium content from our expert contributors plus many other membership benefits.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t<h3>$9.97 per month<\/h3>\n\t\t\t\t<p>Unlimited access<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/join\/\" class=\"button\">Join Now<\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\n\t\t<div class=\"content-restriction-preview\"><p>I have a friend who works in the long-term care industry. They operate facilities for older people who need help living independently. Their services range from assisted living, which requires three meals a day and some basic housekeeping services, to full nursing care, which requires round-the-clock support from a highly trained medical staff.<\/p> <p>In our conversation, he used a term that I have been thinking about a lot: the silver tsunami. Tens of millions of Americans will be moving into the last stage of their lives in the next several years, and there just aren\u2019t enough beds and trained staff to meet the rising demands of an aging population.<\/p> <p>The church is facing its own type of silver tsunami right now regarding the kinds of folks who shoulder the volunteer burden of the church. In many small and medium-sized churches, members organize events, generate financial reports, and do essential maintenance<\/p><\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"content-restriction-block\">\n\t\t\t<div class=\"content-restriction-block-login login-toggle\">Already a member? <a href=\"#\">Log in<\/a><\/div>\n\t\t\t<div class=\"content-restriction-block-content\">\n\t\t\t\t<h2>Unlock premium content!<\/h2>\n\t\t\t\t<p>Get access to all Church Answers premium content from our expert contributors plus many other membership benefits.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t<h3>$9.97 per month<\/h3>\n\t\t\t\t<p>Unlimited access<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/join\/\" class=\"button\">Join Now<\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t","protected":false},"author":17635,"featured_media":830561,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"publish_to_discourse":"0","publish_post_category":"1","wpdc_auto_publish_overridden":"","wpdc_topic_tags":"","wpdc_pin_topic":"","wpdc_pin_until":"","discourse_post_id":"","discourse_permalink":"","wpdc_publishing_response":"","wpdc_publishing_error":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[193,1,175,186,177,178,14796,180,18058,176,196],"tags":[19108,19109,19110,19106,19107],"class_list":["post-830558","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-administration-and-finance","category-church-answers","category-grow","category-health-and-metrics","category-lead","category-membership-and-assimilation","category-monday-wednesday-featured","category-outreach-and-evangelism","category-premium","category-revitalize","category-staff-and-organizational-issues","tag-aging-congregations","tag-church-attendees","tag-religious-beliefs","tag-silver-tsunami","tag-volunteer-crisis","membership-content","access-restricted"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.7 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>The Coming Silver Tsunami: A Volunteer Crisis in Aging Congregations | Church Answers<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"I have a friend who works in the long-term care industry. They operate facilities for older people who need help living independently. Their services range from assisted living, which requires three meals a day and some basic housekeeping services, to full nursing care, which requires round-the-clock support from a highly trained medical staff.In our conversation, he used a term that I have been thinking about a lot: the silver tsunami. Tens of millions of Americans will be moving into the last stage of their lives in the next several years, and there just aren\u2019t enough beds and trained staff to meet the rising demands of an aging population.The church is facing its own type of silver tsunami right now regarding the kinds of folks who shoulder the volunteer burden of the church. In many small and medium-sized churches, members organize events, generate financial reports, and do essential maintenance and repair work on the facility. After looking at the data, I am not entirely sure that pastors are aware of how close they are to seeing many of those volunteers being physically or mentally unable to complete those responsibilities, which they have been doing for decades.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/blog\/the-coming-silver-tsunami-a-volunteer-crisis-in-aging-congregations\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Coming Silver Tsunami: A Volunteer Crisis in Aging Congregations | Church Answers\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"I have a friend who works in the long-term care industry. They operate facilities for older people who need help living independently. Their services range from assisted living, which requires three meals a day and some basic housekeeping services, to full nursing care, which requires round-the-clock support from a highly trained medical staff.In our conversation, he used a term that I have been thinking about a lot: the silver tsunami. Tens of millions of Americans will be moving into the last stage of their lives in the next several years, and there just aren\u2019t enough beds and trained staff to meet the rising demands of an aging population.The church is facing its own type of silver tsunami right now regarding the kinds of folks who shoulder the volunteer burden of the church. In many small and medium-sized churches, members organize events, generate financial reports, and do essential maintenance and repair work on the facility. After looking at the data, I am not entirely sure that pastors are aware of how close they are to seeing many of those volunteers being physically or mentally unable to complete those responsibilities, which they have been doing for decades.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/blog\/the-coming-silver-tsunami-a-volunteer-crisis-in-aging-congregations\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Church Answers\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2024-06-20T10:00:24+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/06\/Cheerful-senior-people-strolling-through-the-park.png\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1200\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"628\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/png\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Ryan Burge\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Ryan Burge\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"7 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/blog\/the-coming-silver-tsunami-a-volunteer-crisis-in-aging-congregations\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/blog\/the-coming-silver-tsunami-a-volunteer-crisis-in-aging-congregations\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Ryan Burge\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/#\/schema\/person\/d5a336fe7fb2e2336148e844c396558a\"},\"headline\":\"The Coming Silver Tsunami: A Volunteer Crisis in Aging Congregations\",\"datePublished\":\"2024-06-20T10:00:24+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/blog\/the-coming-silver-tsunami-a-volunteer-crisis-in-aging-congregations\/\"},\"wordCount\":1237,\"commentCount\":1,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/blog\/the-coming-silver-tsunami-a-volunteer-crisis-in-aging-congregations\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/06\/Cheerful-senior-people-strolling-through-the-park.png\",\"keywords\":[\"Aging Congregations\",\"church attendees\",\"religious beliefs\",\"Silver Tsunami\",\"Volunteer Crisis\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Administration &amp; Finance\",\"Church Answers\",\"Grow\",\"Health &amp; Metrics\",\"Lead\",\"Membership &amp; Assimilation\",\"Monday\/Wednesday Featured\",\"Outreach &amp; Evangelism\",\"Premium\",\"Revitalize\",\"Staff &amp; Organizational Issues\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/blog\/the-coming-silver-tsunami-a-volunteer-crisis-in-aging-congregations\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/blog\/the-coming-silver-tsunami-a-volunteer-crisis-in-aging-congregations\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/blog\/the-coming-silver-tsunami-a-volunteer-crisis-in-aging-congregations\/\",\"name\":\"The Coming Silver Tsunami: A Volunteer Crisis in Aging Congregations | Church Answers\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/blog\/the-coming-silver-tsunami-a-volunteer-crisis-in-aging-congregations\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/blog\/the-coming-silver-tsunami-a-volunteer-crisis-in-aging-congregations\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/06\/Cheerful-senior-people-strolling-through-the-park.png\",\"datePublished\":\"2024-06-20T10:00:24+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/#\/schema\/person\/d5a336fe7fb2e2336148e844c396558a\"},\"description\":\"I have a friend who works in the long-term care industry. 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Danforth Center on Religion and Politics at Washington University in St. Louis. Before that he was an associate professor of political science at Eastern Illinois University, and was also the graduate coordinator. He has authored over thirty peer-reviewed articles and book chapters alongside six books (including The Vanishing Church, The Nones, and The Great Dechurching) about religion and politics in the United States. He served as a pastor in the American Baptist Church for over twenty years, leading First Baptist Church of Mount Vernon, IL for 17.5 years until its closure in July 2024.\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/blog\/author\/ryanburge\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"The Coming Silver Tsunami: A Volunteer Crisis in Aging Congregations | Church Answers","description":"I have a friend who works in the long-term care industry. They operate facilities for older people who need help living independently. 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After looking at the data, I am not entirely sure that pastors are aware of how close they are to seeing many of those volunteers being physically or mentally unable to complete those responsibilities, which they have been doing for decades.","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/blog\/the-coming-silver-tsunami-a-volunteer-crisis-in-aging-congregations\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/blog\/the-coming-silver-tsunami-a-volunteer-crisis-in-aging-congregations\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/blog\/the-coming-silver-tsunami-a-volunteer-crisis-in-aging-congregations\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/06\/Cheerful-senior-people-strolling-through-the-park.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/06\/Cheerful-senior-people-strolling-through-the-park.png","width":1200,"height":628,"caption":"Cheerful senior people strolling through the park"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/blog\/the-coming-silver-tsunami-a-volunteer-crisis-in-aging-congregations\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"The Coming Silver Tsunami: A Volunteer Crisis in Aging Congregations"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/#website","url":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/","name":"Church Answers","description":"","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/#\/schema\/person\/d5a336fe7fb2e2336148e844c396558a","name":"Ryan Burge","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/56879a20cb590828ec05138ab0896cecf173024f2bf472bb1fb8dd0ad8f13fe0?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/56879a20cb590828ec05138ab0896cecf173024f2bf472bb1fb8dd0ad8f13fe0?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Ryan Burge"},"description":"Dr. Ryan Burge is professor of practice at the John C. 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He served as a pastor in the American Baptist Church for over twenty years, leading First Baptist Church of Mount Vernon, IL for 17.5 years until its closure in July 2024.","url":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/blog\/author\/ryanburge\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/830558","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/17635"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=830558"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/830558\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":830568,"href":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/830558\/revisions\/830568"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/830561"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=830558"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=830558"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=830558"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}