Collective Grief

Newsletter May 27, 2024 Together, we're #keepingitsacred...

Today is Memorial Day in the United States. One of my children insisted that this meant that it was a day to enjoy barbecues (and sales!). But that's not how the day was envisioned three years after the end of the Civil War ended. It was meant to be a day to place flowers on the graves of soldiers. The decorations of the gravesites explain the holiday's earlier name, "Decoration Day.” By the time it was officially adopted nationally in 1890, it had become known as Memorial Day, a day to remember. This day reminds us to remember that the cost of war is measured in human lives, often young people, whose time on earth is cut short.

In Israel, the country remembers the dead on Yom HaZikaron/ Memorial Day, where a siren is sounds for two minutes at 11am local time, and everyone stops to hold silence. Even drivers on the freeway pull over to the side of the road, and stand out of respect. 

Holocaust museums like Yad Vashem and the United States Holocaust Museum have memorial rooms, sacred spaces where candles are lit and remembrances are offered, as well.

But there’s another way to remember the collective loss experienced through war, as a community. This past week, we learned about it from our friends at the Parents’ Circle Families’ Forum. This is the community of Israelis and Palestinians who have suffered the loss of close family members due to the conflict. We heard Robi Damelin and Layla Alshaykh share their work, and the work of the family member of over 700 other individual killed to foster peace and a reconciliation effort. They recently held a Joint Israeli-Palestinian Memorial Day Ceremony commemorating the grave losses experience and focusing on the way forward. (Watch it HERE) This is one of the ways they help engage a collective process of movement through grief towards a shared future of peace. This is one of the most beautiful ways I have seen communities collectively remembering.

We need memorial days not to valorize war, but to remember the price of conflict. To remember all that has been lost. To remember the words of Jewish musician Debbie Friedman inspired by prophet Zechariah 4:6, “Not by might nor by power but by spirit alone, shall we all live in peace.”

So, today, I invite you to watch the latest video from our Keeping It Sacred program with the Parents’ Circle Families’ Forum cosponsored by Muslims for Progressive Values and Nefesh HERE. And consider the cost of conflict and the hope of a brighter future.

This is how we’re #keepingitsacred...

Together, we’re #keepingitsacred...

Rabbi Heather Miller

Founder, Keeping It Sacred

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Thanks for your interest, and thanks for #keepingitsacred...