To­mor­row, Ju­ly 26, we will ob­serve the sixth World Day for Grand­par­ents and the El­der­ly, which Pope Fran­cis in­sti­tut­ed in 2021. It aims to ho­n­our the el­der­ly, com­bat lone­li­ness, and bridge gen­er­a­tional di­vides. It is cel­e­brat­ed each year on the fourth Sun­day in Ju­ly, close to the feast of Saints Joachim and Anne, the grand­par­ents of Je­sus. This year the date co­in­cides with the feast of these saints.

Pope Leo XIV has right­ly said that grand­par­ents de­serve our grat­i­tude:

“Dear grand­par­ents and el­der­ly peo­ple, I rec­om­mend that you watch over your loved ones with wis­dom and com­pas­sion, and with the hu­mil­i­ty and pa­tience that come with age.”

Pope Bene­dict XVI had chal­lenged so­ci­ety, stat­ing:

“If grand­par­ents, as is said of­ten…are a pre­cious re­source, it is nec­es­sary to put in­to prac­tice co­her­ent choic­es that al­low them to be bet­ter val­ued.”

Sad­ly, we have a long way to go to demon­strate that we val­ue them.

Pope Fran­cis and Pope Leo XIV have al­so chal­lenged so­ci­ety to launch a “rev­o­lu­tion of care and grat­i­tude” to end the iso­la­tion and aban­don­ment of the el­der­ly. They urge us to re­ject a “throw­away cul­ture” and recog­nise grand­par­ents as a vi­tal reser­voir of wis­dom and the firm foun­da­tion of our fu­ture.

The Vat­i­can’s Di­cas­t­ery for Laity, Fam­i­ly and Life has stat­ed that Pope Leo XIV has cho­sen “I will nev­er for­get you” (Isa­iah 49:15) as the theme for this year’s cel­e­bra­tion.

Deb­o­rah Castel­lano Lubov writes in Vat­i­can News that the World Day is: “pre­sent­ed as an op­por­tu­ni­ty to bring the close­ness of the Church to the el­der­ly and to en­hance their con­tri­bu­tion with­in fam­i­lies and com­mu­ni­ties…Tak­en from the Book of the Prophet Isa­iah, the cho­sen verse is meant to be a mes­sage of con­so­la­tion and hope for all grand­par­ents and el­der­ly peo­ple, es­pe­cial­ly those who live in lone­li­ness or feel for­got­ten.

“At the same time, it is a re­minder to fam­i­lies and ec­cle­sial com­mu­ni­ties not to for­get them, recog­nis­ing in them a pre­cious pres­ence and a bless­ing. The Pope’s choice high­lights how God’s love for every per­son nev­er fails, not even in the fragili­ty of old age.”

I pay trib­ute to Lennox Sir­juesingh, a promi­nent re­tired pri­ma­ry school prin­ci­pal, who has been work­ing dili­gent­ly to pro­mote Grand­par­ents Day in T&T through pub­lic ad­vo­ca­cy and ed­i­to­r­i­al writ­ing. He has pe­ti­tioned na­tion­al lead­ers and or­gan­i­sa­tions to for­mal­ly es­tab­lish a des­ig­nat­ed day ho­n­our­ing the el­der­ly.

His ad­vo­ca­cy stems from his time as a school prin­ci­pal. In Oc­to­ber 1999, his school host­ed a Grand­par­ents Day af­ter staff no­ticed the vi­tal role grand­par­ents played in dai­ly child drop-offs, pick­ups, and school events.

Read Pope Leo’s mes­sage for this year’s cel­e­bra­tion. In­ter alia, he says:

“The Church un­der­stands the suf­fer­ing of her el­der­ly mem­bers; she knows full well that they are all too of­ten viewed through the lens of stereo­types and con­sid­ered a bur­den; she is aware that a prof­it-dri­ven econ­o­my weak­ens fam­i­ly ties; she knows that many el­der­ly peo­ple are left be­hind by chil­dren who are forced to mi­grate or, in some cas­es, to fight in wars. For each of these rea­sons, she joy­ful­ly pro­claims the Lord’s promise: ‘But I will nev­er for­get you!’”

Age­ing coun­try

T&T’s Di­vi­sion of Age­ing clas­si­fies T&T as an “age­ing coun­try” be­cause the num­ber of el­der­ly per­sons has been in­creas­ing ex­po­nen­tial­ly.

There are ap­prox­i­mate­ly 177,767 per­sons over the age of 60 years in T&T (Cen­tral Sta­tis­ti­cal Of­fice, 2011). Ac­cord­ing to the UN World Pop­u­la­tion Prospects (2008), the num­ber of per­sons over 60 in T&T is ex­pect­ed to grow to 30.1 per cent in 2050.

Pol­i­cy mak­ers/econ­o­mists and oth­er stake­hold­ers are aware that T&T faces crit­i­cal de­vel­op­ment chal­lenges with an age­ing pop­u­la­tion—linked to ris­ing life ex­pectan­cy and de­clin­ing birth rates.

Key is­sues in­clude se­vere pen­sion and Na­tion­al In­sur­ance fund de­ple­tion, surg­ing pub­lic health­care costs, a shrink­ing work­force, and a widen­ing gap in pro­fes­sion­al el­der care in­fra­struc­ture.

It is note­wor­thy that the Di­vi­sion of Age­ing (un­der the Min­istry of So­cial De­vel­op­ment and Fam­i­ly Ser­vices) and the En­vi­ron­men­tal Health Di­vi­sion of the Min­istry of Health ac­tive­ly in­spects homes for the aged, en­sur­ing that these fa­cil­i­ties meet es­tab­lished stan­dards of care, build­ing safe­ty, and hy­giene.

As we cel­e­brate the lives of our grand­par­ents and the el­der­ly in TT, let us show our grat­i­tude to them.

Sim­ple acts like ask­ing about their life sto­ries, help­ing with dai­ly er­rands, or main­tain­ing reg­u­lar con­tact can sig­nif­i­cant­ly re­duce lone­li­ness and make them feel deeply val­ued. They de­serve our re­spect, so let us con­tin­ue to ad­vo­cate for their needs and their dig­ni­ty.