Let’s all play our part in reimagining care

The Archbishops’ Reimagining Care Commission is a chance for the church to be a powerful tool for social transformation says our Chief Executive Stephen Hammersley

I welcome the call issued by the Archbishops of Canterbury and York to “reimagine care” so that our most vulnerable adults have all they need to live well until the very end of their lives. At Pilgrims’ Friend Society our experience shows that reimagining care from a biblical perspective is prophetic, practical, and can be powerfully transformational.

The call to reimagine care takes as a start point the value of each person made in the image of God, precious whatever their frailty or vulnerability. It sees the responsibility for valuing older people as a whole community responsibility that the church can lead on as we love our (older) neighbours as ourselves in response to God’s love for us.

Wider society acknowledges this moral starting point but often sets it aside as other priorities crowd in. So it matters that the church takes the lead on delivering this practical challenge and the experience of Pilgrims’ Friend Society, having been caring for older people for more than 200 years, is that taking this lead can have a profound and powerfully transformational difference.

To illustrate, just over 50 years ago a group of Christians from churches in Chippenham were inspired to think along the same lines as the Reimagining Care Commission is now thinking, and, fired by biblical conviction, prayer, and enthusiasm, they banded together to create a home and housing scheme for older Christians. A warm and vibrant community has served older people there ever since and, in 2021, a brand-new home, Middlefields House, was opened, built bespoke to deliver the kind of care and dignity that the Commission is now espousing. Practical things like living in households of 12 rather than in one big home of 48 people matter – it brings family life into the caring context; spiritual things like regular devotions together mean that older people are encouraged in their faith and have the opportunity to pray for their communities; and care teams dedicated to their households mean that the bonds of a special kind of family grow, knitting together a community which supports older people to flourish.

The Reimagining Care Commission calls on society – that’s all of us – to take part in this great social change. Which is why Middlefields House is also home to The Harvest Coffee Shop – a gathering place for the local community to come together for a drink and a bite to eat while also becoming more and more connected to the older people who live in the home.

Our vision, like that of the Archbishops, is to see communities like this across the country – communities that bring together older and younger people as, in particular, we see older people being supported to live the flourishing lives that God has for them. All of this has come from Christian people inspired by the Holy Spirit reimagining care for their town and mobilising resources that the state could never unlock, and the same is true to a greater or lesser extent for at least a hundred towns across the country where we know of Christian people who have acted similarly.

But care doesn’t just mean what happens within the walls of a care home and we know that most care for older adults happens in their own homes. A desire to reach out to those who don’t live with us gave birth to Faith in Later Life, a charity which enables Christians to reach older people where they are. Alongside other charities including Keychange, The Salvation Army, and London City Mission, our vision to see no older person ending their days alone or without the chance to respond to the glorious gospel of Jesus, is well underway. And we are not alone: Linking Lives, Anna Chaplaincy, Parish Nursing Ministries UK, the hospice movement and many others demonstrate the potential power of people persuaded to act by the kind of thinking the Archbishops' Commission is sharing.

The reality of our experience is that when churches value people and their carers as described by the Commission, and when they step out in faith, they end up unlocking emotional, spiritual, and material resources that they often didn’t know they had, transforming older lives one by one.

This is what the country needs: national policies shaped by biblical values and delivered by community-led action as churches are inspired to reach out in love to their neighbours. So, will you come with us as reimagine care together and begin the work of something powerfully transformational in our communities?