Grief, Faith & Culture I

Today, we start a series of posts on grief, faith and culture. People deal with grief in different ways. How they deal with grief and loss can be impacted by their culture and their chosen faith. In an effort to understand the many ways we can alleviate and deal with grief, we’ve begun a series of guest blogs by people of different faiths and cultures. The focus of their posts will be personal stories of how their culture or faith shaped the way in which they dealt with their grief.

Disclaimer: The religious information contained in these guest blog posts are the beliefs of the guest blogger and in no way reflect Fairhaven’s endorsement of any particular religion. 

Turning the Wheel: Death and Wicca by Inspirational Author Mary Caelsto

My father died today, eight years ago, to be exact. He was diagnosed with esophageal cancer around Thanksgiving; by the time of my birthday (mid-January) he was gone. Three short months to realize that the man who had been my rock, my heart, and my soul, was slipping away from me, and there was not a thing I could do about it.

I don’t do grief well. I don’t do “hospitals” or “sick” well either. I’ve always been too emotional and held my heart too close to the surface. But as I’ve grown in my faith, I’ve gotten better. In shuttling mom to and from doctors appointments last year about this time when she had lost the sight in one of her eyes, I came to grips with my father’s loss and with my own grief, which I’d kept bottled up and tucked away out of sight from prying eyes.

I’ve been Wiccan for nearly twenty years, though like most people, I’ve had an on-again, off-again relationship with the gods. My dad knew I was Wiccan. “Are you a witch?” he asked me one day long ago, “because I saw one of those cop tv shows and they showed altars  and that looks like what you have in your apartment.” While I kept quiet on the portrayal of my religion in the media, I couldn’t lie to my father. Yes, I am Wiccan.

I believe in the great wheel of the year. As the seasons move from winter to spring, then summer to fall before turning back to winter, so too, do our lives. We’re children, and we mature into young adults, then mature adults, until we age into elderhood. Eventually, we, like the flowers in winter, die. It’s tough to watch a loved one fade and pass away, tougher still when it happens suddenly. However, when we look at death in the context of the larger wheel of the year and cycles of nature, it becomes if no less difficult, then more understandable. And, like the tulips coming back in the spring, as a Wiccan, I believe our souls return.

In fact, I believe we each were put here to accomplish certain things. When our time is done, so are we. And since our souls choose the method of our birth and the means of our death prior to our incarnation, it can be said that everyone dies as he or she wishes. To know that my father accomplished his goals, though I might not know what they are, comforts me. I rejoice for his accomplishments, even as I mourn his loss.

Thankfully grief is part of the cycle as well. Our tears fall and we turn inward in our grief. We need to work through the process, but eventually we will come through the other side. I no longer break down when I think about my father, though sometimes fond memories or fleeting reminders bring tears. I’m more at ease with my grief, and I believe whether it’s in this life, or the next, I will see my father again.