Blog: The Journey of Grief by Neil Mancor
/The Journey of Grief
The last year has been a journey through fear, uncertainty to boredom, then more fear and uncertainty perhaps to resignation. As COVID-19 has failed to disappear on command but has proven a rather more relentless foe than we expected our lives have been turned upside down. Along with that may come another word that is hard to say and sometimes harder to embrace: grief.
The losses we have suffered are multiple and ongoing. Some of us have suffered the loss of people we have known and loved in circumstances far from normal, without the ability to visit, to touch, to be together one last time. Others of us have been touched more distantly by loss – someone in my wider friendship circle was taken by COVID-19. It was a shock that brought uncomfortable truth closer to home. But then there have been other losses to bear. We have lost the freedom to go about our daily lives without fear. In Church, we have lost the freedom to be together as we have been able to do all our lives. Like everyone else, I have never known a time when Churches were closed to worship, and certainly not for an extended period of time. I miss being with everyone. Even more, I grieve the life we once had but may not have again in quite the same way.
Those losses are real and so is the experience of grief. But sometimes the characteristics of grief within us are unfamiliar and unexpected. That is one of the reasons why as a Diocesan family together with the parish of St Mark’s & St Peters we are offering the GriefShare programme, starting Thursday February 4th We are doing this because acknowledging our losses and our grief is the pathway to growing through them. Grief is not a journey we need to take alone: we can travel along that road together in a safe, supportive environment. It is not an easy journey, nor is there a way to fast-track through it. But it is a journey we can travel through with God and with one another. And that helps us bear the load a little easier.
For more information contact me: nmancor@montreal.anglican.ca. Just remember: you are not alone.
