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The World and Everything In It
5.5.26 The Supreme Court on mail-order mifepristone, UAE departs OPEC, kids gaming and gambling, and exploitation at Churchill Downs
00:35:21
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- [00:06]
Mary Reichert
Good morning. Today, reconsidering mail order abortions.
- [00:10]
Pro-Life Advocate (possibly Christy Hamrick or similar)
Our state laws that say the preborn are valuable from conception, those are being violated. And so we're all headed back to the Supreme Court.
- [00:18]
Nick Eicher
Also today, might we be seeing the beginning of the end for OPEC and how smartphones and video games can get kids hooked on gambling later, an unlikely tool in the fight against human trafficking.
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Rochelle Starr
She got in our van, we took her to the hospital and then we continued to walk alongside her for many months.
- [00:35]
Nick Eicher
And world commentator Janie B. Cheney on what churches lose when seniors quit.
- [00:47]
Mary Reichert
It's Tuesday, May 5th. This is the world and everything in it from listener supported World Radio. I'm Mary Reichert.
- [00:54]
Nick Eicher
And I'm Nick Eicher. Good morning.
- [00:58]
Mary Reichert
Up next, Kent Covington with today's news.
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Kent Covington
The Supreme Court on Monday restored mail order access to the chemical abortion drug mifepristone for now. Justice Samuel Alito signed the order. It pauses a federal appeals court ruling that would have required in person prescriptions. Drug makers asked for the pause over the weekend. Several states have sued the FDA over the mail order policy. We'll have much more on this later in the program. U.S. forces sank at least six Iranian boats on Monday, opening a passage through the Strait of Hormuz. Two American flagged merchant vessels made the transit. Central Command has cleared a mine free passage through the strait. And CENTCOM Commander Admiral Brad Cooper says the operation involved more than 100 aircraft as well as unmanned platforms under the
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Military Official (Admiral Brad Cooper or similar)
sea, on the sea and from the air, and then 15,000 service members to extend this defensive umbrella across the Strait of Hormuz to protect our forces and also has committed to to defend commercial shipping.
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Kent Covington
President Trump warned on Sunday that Iranian efforts to interfere with the operation would be dealt with forcefully. But Iran has vowed to continue firing on ships in the strait. And Admiral Cooper says Iran's Revolutionary Guard
- [02:12]
Military Official (Admiral Brad Cooper or similar)
Corps has launched multiple cruise missiles, drones and small boats at ships we are protecting. We have defeated each and every one of those threats through the clinical application of of defensive munitions.
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Kent Covington
The operation, dubbed Project Freedom, aims to escort hundreds of ships stranded in the Gulf since the war broke out in February. Iran also resumed attacks Monday against the United Arab Emirates, a key American ally. Missiles and drones rained down on the uae. One drone sparked a fire at an oil facility, wounding three workers. It was the first such attack against the country since the three week cease fire began between Iran and the US And Israel. The Trump administration has a bone to pick with the beef industry. Officials at the Justice Department and the Department of Agriculture said Monday that They're looking into allegations of price fixing. Acting Attorney General Todd Blanch in the
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Ilya Shapiro
beef industry, the big four processors control
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Military Official (Admiral Brad Cooper or similar)
over 85% of the beef processing market.
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Ilya Shapiro
Two of the big four are primarily foreign owned. Multiple plant closures across the country, the
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Military Official (Admiral Brad Cooper or similar)
current market structure and high concentration in the industry indicate anti competitive activity.
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Kent Covington
Those Big Four companies are jbs, Tyson, Cargill and National Beef. Officials are asking anyone with information on anti competitive practices like price fixing, bid rigging or procurement fraud to come forward. But representatives from the meat industry say that price fixing is not to blame for the high cost of hamburgers. Instead, they say, an ongoing cattle shortage is the culprit. Republican state lawmakers in Alabama met Monday to redraw congressional districts and Tennessee's special session begin begins today. World's Kristin Flavin has more governors of
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Kristin Flavin
both states called the sessions after last week's Supreme Court ruling. The justices struck down a majority black district in Louisiana, saying the map relied too heavily on race. Florida has already approved new districts that could give Republicans up to four more House seats. Other Southern states are eyeing similar moves before the November midterms. Texas redrew its map last summer to add five Republican leaning districts in November. California redrew its map in an effort to add up to five Democratic seats. And Virginia voters approved another map last month that could give Democrats four additional seats there. For World I'm Kristen Flavin.
- [04:34]
Kent Covington
Authorities are working to contain a suspected outbreak of the deadly hantavirus on a cruise ship off the coast of West Africa. Three passengers have already died and three more people are seriously ill, including two crew members. Paul Hunter is a professor of medicine at the University of East Anglia.
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Paul Hunter
You acquire the infection typically from breathing in aerosols that are contaminated with rat urine and feces or rodent urine and feces. And so one of the riskiest things is cleaning out rats nests from your house.
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Kent Covington
The cruise ship left Argentina for Antarctica with nearly 150 people on board as of Monday. Officials in Cape Verde refused to let anyone off the boat, citing public health concerns. The World Health Organization says it's possible that hentavirus could be spread between people, but Hunter says there have been some
- [05:29]
Paul Hunter
suggestions that it might, but other researchers have cast doubt on that evidence. So it's not clear if person to person spread does happen. It's probably quite, quite uncommon.
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Kent Covington
The WHO says public health risk remains low. Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani is breathing on his own after being hospitalized with pneumonia and placed on a ventilator. Giuliani's spokesperson said Monday that the 81 year old remains in critical condition but is stable at a Florida hospital. Current New York City Mayor Zoram Mamdani offered his well wishes on Monday.
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Rochelle Starr
I know that many New Yorkers are concerned by the reports that he's in
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Jeremy Morrell
critical condition and so we do keep
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Rochelle Starr
him and his family in our prayers at this time.
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Kent Covington
Spokesman Todd Goodman said Giuliani's condition was exacerbated by restrictive airway disease that's attributed to his exposure to dust and toxins from the 911 attack on the World Trade Center. I'm Kent Covington. And coming up, fighting child gambling problems plus an effort to stop sex trafficking at the Kentucky Derby. This is the World and Everything in It.
- [06:54]
Nick Eicher
It's Tuesday, the 5th of May. Glad to have you along for today's edition of the World and Everything In It. Good morning. I'm Nick Eicher.
- [07:02]
Mary Reichert
And I'm Mary Reichard. Up first, rethinking the rules for abortion drugs. A legal battle in Louisiana over the drug mifepristone may be headed for the Supreme Court to decide whether to bring back stronger safety measures. The fifth Circuit Court of Appeals late last week reinstated previous FDA rules requiring mifepristone to be dispensed in person with a doctor rather than by mail.
- [07:27]
Nick Eicher
This is the latest development in a legal and cultural battle that goes back decades about abortion pill safety. Friday's order by the 5th Circuit temporarily blocked the FDA's current rules easing abortion pill availability. When drug manufacturers asked the Supreme Court to weigh in, Justice Samuel Alito ordered an administrative stay. Constitutional scholar Ilya Shapiro, meaning that the
- [07:52]
Ilya Shapiro
lower court order is put on hold for a few days, literally a few days, while the Supreme Court receives further briefing and considers whether to put in a stay pending a petition to the Supreme Court.
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Mary Reichert
The pill cuts off the growth hormone from the uterus, starving the baby to death. French authorities approved the drug in 1988, but it faced opposition in the U.S. eben Fowler worked for a Kansas City pharmaceutical company that later merged with Roussel Yukloff, the French company that developed mifepristone.
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Eben Fowler
I was also in touch with some of the upper management people that I worked with, telling them that they really needed to do whatever they could do to shut the drug down to get rid of the patent and essentially take it out of the hands of people who could distribute it. That's unfortunately not what happened.
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Nick Eicher
Eventually, a rapid review led to FDA approval under President Bill Clinton. Fowler says the drug company's guidelines for dispensing mifepristone don't fully take into account the drug's dangers, but they do ensure some safety measures.
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Eben Fowler
You needed to see a doctor ahead of time, you needed to come back and see them again to make sure that you're not going to have some kind of a problem such as hemorrhaging, et cetera.
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Mary Reichert
The company also recommended the drug not be used after seven weeks of pregnancy. But the FDA under President Joe Biden loosened the rules. During the COVID 19 pandemic, FDA allowed male distribution as late as 10 weeks into pregnancy. Pro life doctors sued, saying the rules forced them to finish abortions when mail order drugs left women in medical emergencies. But the Supreme Court ruled in 2024 the doctors lacked standing to challenge the FDA's rules, saying the doctors did not provide sufficient evidence their conscience protections were being violated. Now state governments are weighing in, saying out of state prescribers are undermining local pro life protections.
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Ilya Shapiro
Ilya Shapiro again so now it's Louisiana as a state bringing similar challenge to its availability by mail, not having a requirement to see a physician, and other certain loosening of the regulations surrounding this medication.
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Nick Eicher
So far, the Trump administration has asked the courts to wait on a pending FDA review of mifepristone, but that review is reportedly on hold until after the midterm elections. Christy Hamrick is vice president of media and policy for the group Students for Life.
- [10:20]
Pro-Life Advocate (possibly Christy Hamrick or similar)
We're left with states like Louisiana going people are dying, women and children and no one seems to care. And our state laws that say that the preborn are valuable from conception, those are being violated. And so we're all headed back to
- [10:35]
Mary Reichert
the Supreme Court for this week. Though drug companies can continue mailing abortion drugs, Shapiro says it serves as a pause button while the court looks into the case, not an indicator on how it might rule. He laid out two scenarios.
- [10:50]
Ilya Shapiro
It could enter a stay of the lower court ruling, meaning that ruling would not be in effect and the mifepristone would be available by mail.
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Nick Eicher
Or the court could lift the stay and allow the Fifth Circuit ruling to go into effect while the Supreme Court considers taking up a case on the merits. The FDA and Louisiana have until Thursday to respond, and the stay ordered by Justice Alito expires next Monday. Coming up next on the WORLD and everything in it oil industry shakeups in the Middle east. Opec, the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, oversees oil production in the region. Its stated goal is to ensure stable supply. But OPEC is considered a cartel. It's made up of 12 member countries which decide on prices for the global market. Then their economists estimate demand and calculate the approach appropriate level of supply to achieve that target price. By intentionally taking oil off the market, OPEC uses its leverage to act as the deciding body for the global price.
- [12:00]
Mary Reichert
But OPEC got some surprising news last week when the United Arab Emirates severed ties after six decades. World's Emma Eicher on what the move might mean.
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Emma Eicher
The United Arab EMirates is the third largest oil producer in OPEC and its abrupt exit on May 1 signals a potential new order in the Middle East. It's a move that isn't unprecedented, but Heritage foundation economist E.J. antoni says what the UAE started may be hard to stop, but it could
- [12:29]
Jeremy Morrell
very well turn out that this is the first snowflake, so to speak, in the snowball effect that will eventually be the unraveling of that cartel.
- [12:38]
Emma Eicher
The unraveling comes down to the interplay of supply and demand. Typically, OPEC acts as a gatekeeper, keeping oil prices artificially high by limiting how much its members can supply to global markets. It's a strategy that has worked for decades, made even tighter by the closure of the Strait of Hormuz. But the UAE is done waiting for the gate to reopen.
- [13:00]
Jeremy Morrell
The uae, I think, is positioning themselves to be able to meet that huge surge in demand by coming up with a big increase in production. If they're still part of OPEC, OPEC is going to have their boot on UAE's neck, essentially trying to tell them don't produce more.
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Emma Eicher
Saudi Arabia has the biggest boot in OPEC as its top oil producer, and some anticipate the Saudis will retaliate. Even though the UAE produces less than half the output of Saudi Arabia, it can still threaten Saudi revenues by loosening the cartel's control over supply. Meaning if the UAE pumps at will, that puts downward pressure prices. The UAE's long standing relationship with Saudi Arabia has remained tense.
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Paul Hunter
They don't always see eye to eye with the politics of Saudi Arabia, particularly external policies.
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Emma Eicher
Michael Timvikis is a professor of commodity economics and finance at Citizen George's University of London. He says that because oil is a global commodity, these two neighbors are head to head competitors in the same markets. And their rivalry could spark price wars.
- [14:07]
Paul Hunter
This is where Saudis may start undercutting UAE cargoes. The oils they export are very close in terms of quality, so they can easily replace each other. They may even compete with other markets like Europe and even the United States. Although these are smaller markets.
- [14:25]
Emma Eicher
Prices will stay high with the Strait of Hormuz closed and supplies restricted. But once it reopens and the UAE pumps out more oil, prices are predicted to stabilize.
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Paul Hunter
Hopefully we're going to see a lot more oil in the market and the price is eventually coming down again.
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Emma Eicher
The UAE is a strategic ally of the West. Israel recently supplied the country with laser systems to counteract drone and missile attacks from Iran. And some have said the UAE's exit is noteworthy for the US Jim Crane is an energy research fellow at Rice University's Baker Institute in Houston.
- [15:00]
Jim Crane
The UAE has kind of been, been seeing itself more of a partner of the US in Israel than the other countries in the Gulf. I think it would like to, to have a bigger role in Washington and it sees the cartel kind of holding them back from their, you know, achieving their geopolitical ambitions.
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Emma Eicher
While the UAE's move is a win for the consumer market, volatility will hit US Oil industries hard.
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Jim Crane
You know, the US might not be producing anything if it weren't for OPEC taking so much oil off the market and underinvesting in its own resources. So, you know, by, by doing this, by keeping oil off the market and keeping prices high, that's allowing the U.S. oil industry to stay in business and stay profitable.
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Emma Eicher
Because US Fracking is often more expensive than traditional drilling, it requires a higher market price to make economic sense. By propping up prices, OPEC has strengthened American competitors. But long term, the UAE is betting that independence is worth more than the cartel's protection.
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E.J. Antoni
E.J.
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Emma Eicher
antoni of the Heritage foundation says that once the market adjusts, those who can produce the most will lead the way.
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Jeremy Morrell
When everyone's trying to refill reserves, they're going to be the big winner. Obviously. Any oil consuming nation though is also going to benefit somewhat and that would include us here in the United States. It should produce some downward pressure on oil prices in the long run.
- [16:24]
Emma Eicher
Reporting for World, I'm Emma Eicher.
- [16:32]
Ilya Shapiro
Additional support comes from homeschool diploma, elevating graduation for home and private schools with custom diplomas, regalia invites and more. Homeschool Diploma.com from Pensacola Christian College Academic Excellence Biblical Worldview, Affordable cost Go pcci. Edu World. And from Ambassadors Impact Network where faith driven investors find financial and spiritual support from private investors. Ambassadorsimpact.com
- [17:10]
Nick Eicher
up next on the world and everything in it. Putting the odds back in children's favorite. Thanks to the Internet, what happens in Vegas no longer just stays in Vegas. Slot machines, bingo, roulette and other games of chance all enjoy easy entry into homes.
- [17:26]
Mary Reichert
Now most states ban gambling for people under 18 but illegal betting sites often find ways around laws, and those young people are often the biggest losers. World's Lauren Smith has the story.
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Lauren Smith
Kurt Freudenberg knew he had an addiction by age 12. He hid it so well that his mother Kim, didn't see the signs until he left for college. She'd check his location and realized he almost never left his room.
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Kim Freudenberg
He was not showering, not brushing his teeth, washing clothes, hardly eating, peeing in a plastic tub in his dorm room so he didn't have to leave the computer.
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Lauren Smith
Kurt's grade slipped and he dropped out. When he got home, his parents sat him down.
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Kim Freudenberg
We kind of just like waited him out, like, looked at him, kept quiet, waited for him to fess up, thinking he was gonna say it was drugs. And he just said, I'm gambling.
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Lauren Smith
Kurt had been a gamer in middle school. His parents knew he spent real money on in game items like costumes and special weapons for his character. What they didn't know was that he'd trade those items for tokens on illegal offshore gambling sites.
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Kim Freudenberg
And he was a normal kid. Like he, you know, ran track, he played soccer, he had good grades, he was a good student. And then he went to college, where he then started getting into, like crypto, casinos, sports betting, all kinds of betting.
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Lauren Smith
Kurt isn't alone. A 2025 study from the UK found nearly a third of kids under 18 spent money on gambling within the past year. Most of it seems harmless bets between family members, casual card games or claw machines at the arcade. But about 2% showed early signs of a gambling problem and some had already lost control. Kate Huebel is director of public affairs at the national center for Problem Gambling. She says more and more children have started calling the help hotline.
- [19:16]
E.J. Antoni
They have access to a mobile phone, they are very tech literate and they have been playing video games with Minecraft and loot boxes their whole life.
- [19:26]
Lauren Smith
Minecraft is an online world building game marketed for kids ages 10 and up. Some experts worry the in game treasure chests, which drop random digital items, are early exposure to gambling mechanics and, and kids who start betting young are almost twice as likely as their peers to develop an addiction later in life. The digital nature of the currency doesn't
- [19:51]
E.J. Antoni
help the comprehension of we're playing video games or, you know, we're playing with pretend money. Then I turn 18 or 21 and it's real money, but it's still all, you know, digital. We're not playing with cash and chips the same way 20 years ago. And that mental shift, I think is hard for a lot of Those young mushy brains to comprehend.
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Lauren Smith
Some European countries and the state of New York have taken legal action to prevent kids from accessing games with loot boxes that drop random items and can be purchased with real money, saying they violate local gambling laws. But simply restricting gambling mechanics in video games won't stop kids from being exposed. Now you don't even have to go to a casino. The casino will come to you.
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Military Official (Admiral Brad Cooper or similar)
The crowd is psyched.
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Nick Eicher
Cause all my rowdy friends are bout for Monday night.
- [20:45]
Lauren Smith
There's football on tv. The odds appear at the bottom of the screen and ads for betting sites play during commercial breaks. A decade ago, only Nevada had fully legal sports betting. Then in 2018, the Supreme Court ruled the federal government couldn't stop other states from legalizing it. 39 states plus Washington D.C. opened sports betting markets. And with that change came lots of new marketing. In theory, gambling sites have access restrictions for children under 18. But those restrictions can open the door to black market sites. Sometimes the odds may be rigged. Let the kid win a little to keep him coming back. Here's Kim Freudenberg again.
- [21:23]
Kim Freudenberg
They think that gambling is a way to make money, not understanding at all about how the product is designed for you to lose. And it's designed for you to lose as much as possible as fast as possible. Right, because that's, that's the system, you know of the slot machine, near misses, losses, disguises, wins, Right. This is all psychological things to keep you playing.
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Lauren Smith
In the depths of his addiction, her son Kurt stole from his family and sold his belongings to fund bets. But for many gamblers, losses go far beyond just the money.
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Kim Freudenberg
One in five problem gamblers at some point will attempt to take their life because they get so, it's so hidden and it can get so bad before people notice.
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Lauren Smith
Even after Kim found out she didn't know how to help her son, the lack of resources eventually drove her to start her own non profit for Kurt. She cobbled together resources, first sending him to a therapist. He recovered, relapsed and dropped out of college again. Then he spent a month in inpatient therapy. He's been clean for three years. He's back in college and this time he's thriving. It's a happy ending for one story. But Kim says the trap that snared her son can still endanger other kids.
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Kim Freudenberg
It's so dangerous and like most people, just don't see it coming. And we're just not ready for what's going to happen.
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Lauren Smith
4World I'm Lauren Smith.
- [23:07]
Nick Eicher
Well, Cincinnati radio just picked up a signal from the past. The call letters WKRP from from the late 70s sitcom about a fictional radio station are coming back for real to the city that made them famous. And the man helping to make it happen could barely contain himself.
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Military Official (Admiral Brad Cooper or similar)
WKRP, after 48 years, is coming to Cincinnati.
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Nick Eicher
That's DP McEntire. He got it done. He runs a small nonprofit station in North Carolina, WKRP a call sign. He's treated less as property and more as a piece of radio history. So when he found a group willing to bring WKRP to its rightful home, he awarded the rights. Formats change. Stations come and go, but some signals never really fade. It's the world and everything in it.
- [24:19]
Mary Reichert
Today is Tuesday, May 5th. Thank you for turning to world radio to help start your day. Good morning. I'm Mary Reichard.
- [24:25]
Nick Eicher
And I'm Nick Eicher. Coming next on the world and everything in it. Combating exploitation During Derby week, big events bring big crowds and with them, sometimes hidden costs.
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Mary Reichert
This past weekend, more than 150,000 people packed Churchill Downs. But just beyond the track, another group was at work reaching women in need. World's Amy Etchison has the story.
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Amy Etchison
The rose is one of the Kentucky Derby's many rich traditions.
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Nick Eicher
Welcome to Churchill Downs.
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Amy Etchison
Along with the hats, the drinks and the call to post, Roses became the race's official flower after they were presented to women attending a Derby party. By the 1890s, race officials would drape a rose garland around the winning horse's neck. But the rose has another significance for Rochelle Starr, founder of Scarlet Hope, a Louisville based nonprofit. For nearly two decades, she's led an outreach to a different kind of woman, a woman who is either trafficked or involved in the sex trade in and around Louisville. Their calling card is a single red rose with information about a helpline.
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Rochelle Starr
Would you like a rose today? Sure. How are you?
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Eben Fowler
I'm good.
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Military Official (Admiral Brad Cooper or similar)
Good.
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Rochelle Starr
We're just out here telling women that Jesus loves them and see how you are today and how we can pray for you.
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Amy Etchison
Scarlet Hope staff and volunteers do outreach work year round, but make a special four day push leading up to the Derby and other sporting events like the Super Bowl. They load up in vans to hit the streets, hotels and strip clubs where exploitation occurs. Starr remembers one woman who cried and fell into her arms when she saw the rose.
- [26:12]
Rochelle Starr
She had just been sold from her boyfriend, which is her Pam. She had a very, very dark encounter with what we would call a john and a customer. And I asked her if she wanted to get out and if she wanted you know, if she felt like she had a choice.
- [26:29]
Amy Etchison
According to Louisville Tourism, the Derby is the region's largest tourism driver, bringing $400 million in economic impact.
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Rochelle Starr
The derby is not the problem, but the Derby increases all of that exploitation, tourism and all of those things in our city.
- [26:45]
Amy Etchison
Churchill Downs, the Derby's racetrack, sits amid a center of sexual exploitation.
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Rochelle Starr
What I would consider the capital of the industry in Louisville, Kentucky. She was right in the middle of, you know, the elite, the upper class, the people going to the derby.
- [27:03]
Amy Etchison
Jeremy Morrell is deputy commissioner of Kentucky's Office of Counter Exploitation. He says his office fights human trafficking year round. But big events increase the challenge.
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Nick Eicher
While we can't comment on specifics, these crimes often do increase during Derby week.
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Amy Etchison
Fighting them means involving local and state law enforcement as well as the FBI and Homeland Security. Ricky Lynn was Kentucky's first human trafficking detective. He's participated in dozens of stings.
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Nick Eicher
We have over 100 websites in Kentucky
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Military Official (Admiral Brad Cooper or similar)
you can buy people on and we average about 9,000 ads a day.
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Amy Etchison
During the past decade, Lynn has helped train officers and community members to deal with predators and victims. He says it's important not to sensationalize, but to use the focus around a sporting event to get more people involved in helping out.
- [27:53]
Nick Eicher
If I post an ad online for
- [27:55]
Military Official (Admiral Brad Cooper or similar)
a 14 year old kid, somebody's probably there in five minutes to pick that person up. Whether it's an adult or kid, Star
- [28:03]
Amy Etchison
stays focused on the victims. She doesn't make a distinction between a women who are being trafficked using sex for survival or sex for sale.
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Rochelle Starr
We are there to minister to anybody in a strip club, in a brothel, anybody on the street, online, in an alarm massage parlor. And within that context of those establishments, we find human trafficking victims.
- [28:28]
Amy Etchison
The woman she met in the streets outside Churchill Downs was being trafficked. She didn't think she could leave that life.
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Rochelle Starr
And I said, you have a choice and you can actually go with us today and we will get you help. She got in our vehicle, our van, and we took her to the hospital and then we continued to walk around alongside her for many, many months.
- [28:47]
Amy Etchison
After that, she went into rehab for an addiction and completed the program. This summer, the ministry will expand efforts to several cities that are hosting the World Cup.
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Rochelle Starr
This is exactly why Jesus came to this earth. He came to die for all of this, you know, and every, every sin and every broken piece. But these women often haven't been told that. And they certainly don't believe that God loves them or that God support for them.
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Amy Etchison
On Saturday, the 40 pound Garland placed on the winning horse's neck featured 400 red Freedom roses individually sewn into satin backing. But other roses could be called freedom roses too. They went to women who may never set foot inside the gates of Churchill Downs, but who now have the resources to start down a different path. The World I'm Amy Etchison with additional reporting from Jasmine Friesen in Louisville, Kentucky.
- [30:18]
Nick Eicher
Good morning. This is the World and everything in it from listener supported World Radio. I'm Nick Iger.
- [30:23]
Mary Reichert
And I'm Mary Reichard. Coming next, a quiet trend in American churches easy to miss but hard to reverse.
- [30:33]
Janie Buchaney
My former neighbor Ed joined our church around the same time I did. He befriended my late husband and became one of the few people Doug remembered as his memory declined. On Sundays, he would look for Ed after church, just to touch base with someone he knew. Ed was going through some rough family issues and had just picked up a new hobby, pickleball. He told me he had found something with his court buddies that he'd been missing, namely a sense of community and shared purpose. Shortly after, we didn't see him at church anymore. No explanation. He just stopped going. Ed is an example of an under reported phenomenon, the so called silent exodus of seniors from church. Most of them had been lifelong churchgoers like Ed. They had raised families that they herded into a car on Sunday mornings while their neighbors slept in. They had set aside their tithes and prayed for missionaries, conducted family devotionals and sent the kids to church camp. But now there's a significant shift among Christians over the age of 65. Gallup reports that in the year 2000, about 60% of American seniors attended church every week. By 2020, the number was 45%. Pew Research notes a similar drop of nearly 10 percentage points in that age group. What's happening? Pastors noticed a change after Covid when many of their congregants didn't come back once lockdowns lifted. But the trend had already begun. Some of it is understandable as older baby boomers begin to lose their eyesight, hearing, mobility and memory. Some are caring for spouses or even older parents. Others have lost partners and friends along with the warmth of fellowship after half their Sunday school class has passed away. Even worse, they may feel that the whole church has grown away from them all. The focus is about attracting young families and building relevant teen ministries so the kids don't drift away once they're on their own. Seniors can feel out of place, mere pew warmers and check writers, while the energy of the pastoral team is directed elsewhere and the loud music and the new songs. And whose idea was it to bring in the strobe lights and the fog machine? Except for legitimate health concerns, none of it is any reason to forsake the assembly. But the assembly should remember that seniors still have a lot to give and to receive. As an old man himself, the Apostle John acknowledged that all ages contributed to the vitality of a church. In his first letter, he says, I write to you fathers because you know him who is from the beginning. I write to you young men because you are strong and the word of God abides in you. The old bring wisdom from experience. The young provide energy. The widow knows God's faithfulness to a degree. The new mother is just beginning to learn. The little children bring joy and purpose to her life. With every birthday party invitation, we seniors needn't fade away or look for community on the pickleball court. We have a responsibility to reach out to the young, and they have the responsibility to respond. 4World I'm Janie Buchaney.
- [34:11]
Mary Reichert
Tomorrow Hunter Baker joins us to talk politics for Washington Wednesday and how the church can strengthen marriage. We'll have an interview with author JP Deganz on saving faith and family. That and more tomorrow. I'm Mary Reichert.
- [34:25]
Nick Eicher
And I'm Nick Eicher. The world and everything in it comes to you from World Radio. World's mission is biblically objective journalism that informs, educates and inspires. The Bible says, jesus answered, my kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would have been fighting that I might not be delivered over to the Jews. But my kingdom is not from the world. Then Pilate said to him, so you are a king. Jesus answered, you say that I am a king. For this purpose I was born, and for this purpose I have come into the world to bear witness to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth listens to my voice. Pilate said to him, what is truth? Verses 36 through 38 of the Gospel of John, chapter 18 go now in grace and peace.