This past June, scholars, practitioners, support workers, health care experts, and interested parties from across the globe gathered together virtually over the course of three weeks to advance the connections between spiritual practice and the effects of aging at the ninth International Conference on Aging and Spirituality. The conference connected researchers with practitioners in a way that fosters community and advances this important intersection of care.
Jane Kuepfer, Schlegel Specialist in Spirituality and Aging at Grebel and the Schlegel-UW Research Institute for Aging, worked with an established committee as the conference co-coordinator, to offer the conference online, after the pandemic made it unfeasible to host an in-person conference. “Many people were excited for the opportunity to participate in this conference virtually,” she explained, “especially in the midst of the pandemic, when they are longing for meaningful engagement.”
With participants tuning in from eight countries, under the theme of Vital Connections: Claiming Voice and Learning to Listen, speakers covered topics of COVID-19 and pandemic care in elder spaces, moral injury, medicine and spiritual well being, workplace engagement, dementia, oral traditions in Afro-Indigenous communities, mental health, art interventions, and more.
“The conference has been an opportunity for researchers from a variety of disciplines, along with spiritual care practitioners, to collaborate—sharing observations and research findings and learning together about spiritual needs we hold in common across religions and cultures as we grow older,” explained Jane. “It’s also an opportunity to engage diverse resources, like the Australian Aboriginal practice of Dadirri, the Ba’al Shem Tov’s 3-step approach to unwelcome experiences (Jewish), or the use of storytelling and song by East African elders.”
