ABSTRACT
Religion has played a minor role in gerontological research to explain the aging process, in teaching about the social psychological behavior of normal aging, and in the aging network as a source of social psychological support of older people. It took the budget cuts of the 1980s to arouse the interest of the aging network in religious organizations as a major source (of resources) available to help continue their programs and services. Agencies faced with the necessity of developing cooperative programs with churches/synagogues found they had little research information or staff specialists in agency and church programming to guide them.
