Grief + Chanting Circle

"Grief and loss touch us all. When we gather in community for a grief ritual, the many tributaries of sorrow flow into the room. They swirl around us, touching everyone in the circle. We listen as the faces of loss are named: the death of a partner, a child, a marriage; the suicide of a parent or sibling; cancer and its rapacious consumption of life; a home lost through foreclosure; broken childhoods filled with alcoholism, violence, and neglect; the lingering scars of those who fought in wars; chronic illnesses that depress and debilitate; lives lost to addiction; and a prevailing sorrow for our struggling world. As we come to the end of the sharing, there is a dawning recognition that this is our shared sorrow, the communal cup from which we all drink. It is ours to hold and gradually empty. We do this together as we enter the healing…