I would like to suggest three related hypotheses regarding today’s Gospel reading. 

First, the theme of the passage is prophecy. The reading introduces two everyday prophets – Simeon and Anna – who both recognise the eschatological significance of the child Jesus. Furthermore, the whole scene opens with a reference to the law set out by, arguably, the paradigmatic prophet – Moses. 

My second hypothesis is that today’s reading uses the theme of prophecy to explore a rather abstract and difficult topic: the nature of time. The Mosaic law, which appears at the beginning of the passage, immediately anchors the Gospel in the ancient events of Exodus. The reference to an established historical tradition is then contrasted at the end of the passage with the prophecy of Anna, which speaks of the future deliverance of Jerusalem. The relationship between the past and the future – i.e. between the beginning and the end of today’s reading – is consolidated by the words of Simeon in the middle of the passage, which speak of the present: it is now that Simeon can finally depart, having seen the Messiah.  

My third hypothesis is that the mention of Anna’s old age – emphasised by the contrast with the subject of her prophecy: the child Jesus – is far from accidental. In fact, I believe that Anna’s age has a specific function in the passage; I would like to suggest that the figure of Anna offers an accessible exemplification of how the, admittedly, intimidating themes of prophecy and time – an extraordinary gift and an esoteric concept – intersect in the everyday and relatable experience of ageing. 

The last hypothesis can be further elaborated with the help of Emmanual Levinas – a brilliant 20th century Jewish philosopher. For Levinas, ageing consists of an irrecuperable loss of time. However, Levinas tells us, this inevitable temporal process is counteracted by social relations. Our encounter with someone older enables us to connect with a past which precedes our birth; a child, on the other hand, represents future possibilities which continue after our death. In short, our interactions with others enable us to experience time, which precedes and transcends our individual lifetimes. In consequence, a self who is subjected to old age and embedded in social relations bears witness to the intersection of two seemingly opposing temporal processes: the loss of time proper to ageing and the intergenerational extension of time – the latter marking a relationship with temporalities which both fill up and overflow my lifetime (Levinas 1969; 1998; 2017).

If we now return to Anna, we can suggest – following Levinas’s insights – that the mention of her age is intended to signify not only the inevitability of ageing and the concomitant loss of time, but the parallel process of gaining time. Her daily piety in the temple bears witness to the Mosaic tradition and the law of her ancestors – a relationship with an ancient past; Anna’s encounter with Jesus, in turn, opens her up to that which is to-come – her experience of the child becomes a promise of future deliverance. Anna’s ageing subjectivity becomes an intersection of that which is, that which has been, and that which will be. Anna’s exceptional gift of prophecy, in turn, enables her to recognise in the everyday fact of ageing and sociality an extraordinary sign: the fullness of time she experiences when facing Jesus, which counteracts or mends her self-presence fractured due to old age, prefigures the messianic era and the fulfilment of the Mosaic law. In the words of Levinas, in today’s passage, “the kingdom of God…signifies in the form of subjectivity” (2017, 52).

How does your relationship to age and ageing affect your perspective on time, prophecy, present, and future? What might you understand that others don’t? What might others understand that could add to your perspective?

At your age, and where you’re at in your life, what would you like intergenerational solidarity to look like? How can you show it to others, and what would you like to receive? How could you work toward that solidarity in your life?

In the preceding sections, I emphasised the prophetic potential of intergenerational experience – as we have seen, the intertwining of the past, the present, and the future can produce images of a better world, whether in the case of  Anna who, having faced the child Jesus in her old age, prophesies the deliverance of Jerusalem; or in the case of the readers of Laudato si’, are encouraged to recognise how the well-being of past and future generations reinforces one another. 

However, we should note that intergenerational experience of time doesn’t necessarily lead to prophetic ideas; sometimes, the awareness of other generations can feel alienating, compounding the sense of a lost or fractured time proper to ageing. In the film The Substance (2024 IMDb), a TV celebrity, Elisabeth Sparkle, is told that she should retire due to her age; shortly after, she is offered a mysterious drug which can generate a younger version of herself. This youthful clone – called Sue – takes over Elisabeth’s TV job as fitness influencer, excelling at it. Here is the catch: although the eponymous substance was intended to renew Elisabeth’s youth, as it were, extending her time, the presence and popularity of Sue ends up deepening Elisabeth’s sense of alienation, isolation, and deterioration. 

While The Substance effectively illustrates the risk inherent in intergenerational experiences, the 2022 documentary A Bunch of Amateurs (2022 IMDb) shows how older people can become active agents in the struggle against estrangement and loneliness. The film tells a true story of a film club in Bradford, England, which has been running since 1932. The viewer finds the club under a threat of closure – to prevent it, the mostly elderly club members must attend to the dire financial situation of the club, to the deteriorating interior of their building, and to the problem of young delinquents regularly graffitiing the outside wall. The already worrying situation is made worse by the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic which, for older club members, marks a period of isolation and the proximity to death. And yet, the story of A Bunch of Amateurs is one of hope – the club members’ attempts to counteract the loss of time through community filmmaking amounts to waging a joyful battle against alienation and social fragmentation. 

If The Substance warns us against irresponsibly prioritizing the future over the past, then A Bunch of Amateurs demonstrates how becoming responsible for what we inherit, and confronting the limitations imposed on us by our current condition is a necessary condition for a future well-being. The elderly club members, therefore, embody Pope Francis’s dictum in Evangelii gaudium that “time is greater than space” (222) – the fullness of time they bear witness to allows the viewer to encounter the practice of everyday prophetism, so beautifully exemplified by Anna in the Gospel reading.