Eighteen months ago, Northhampton Friends Meeting (Northampton, Massachusetts) Pastoral Care Committee co-clerk, Joanna Dalin began facilitating a monthly Coping with Loss (CWL) group with two facilitators and an elder holding the group. Joanna is a Licensed Mental Health Counselor who specializes in working with college students, and her work is also shaped by her life as a writer. Her leadings focus on creating intimate communities where needs are met with integrity and care.

On March 17, the New England Yearly Meeting hosted a workshop, An Introduction to Coping with Loss groups, supported by Friends Foundation for the Aging. Joanna began the session with a quote, “To ‘listen’ another’s soul into a condition of disclosure and discovery may be almost the greatest service that any human being ever performs for another.” — Douglas Steere, On Listening to Another (1955) Joanna Dalin provided friends, Meetings and Quarters to learn about this meaningful program as follows.

What is a CWL group?

• It is a meeting for worship with attention to grief and loss.
• It is a peer support space, led by at least one facilitator who provides structure and supported by an elder who helps hold the group and attend to Spirit.
• It meets monthly—in our Meeting, on Zoom only—for an hour and fifteen minutes.
• It is open and drop-in—people can attend as needed, and they do not have to commit to coming each time.
• Its purpose is to offer support and accompaniment to those who are experiencing or processing loss.
• And over time, it becomes a small community.

How does a CWL group work?

• We use the basic model of worship sharing. We sit together in silence and listen for the leadings of Spirit as we hold one another’s experiences of grief and loss.
• From that deep and sacred place, Friends may share what is present for them in the moment.
• Each month there is a suggested topic related to grief and loss, and …
• Friends are always welcome to speak to other aspects of grief and loss that are on their minds and in their hearts.

The workshop included a 35 minute experience, rather than the actual group’s process for 75 minutes of sharing. The experience included the Topic: What is your relationship with grief and loss?

• How are you relating to grief and loss as spring approaches?
• What role do grief and loss play in your spiritual life today?
• What needs (either personal or communal) do you see around grief and loss? This was followed by a debriefing both clinical and spiritual with time for questions.

What does a CWL facilitator do?

1. 1. I open the group with a quote to meditate on and an invitation to worshipful silence. This opening is a threshold experience. It’s an invitation into a sacred space created with Spirit and beloved community to hold grief and loss. I think of such practice as “co-regulation with Spirit in the presence of community.” This means that our nervous systems start to calm when we gather and listen for Spirit’s wisdom. Such down-regulation (meaning calmness as we move into more relaxed states) can soothe feelings of grief and fear.
   2. I break the silence and welcome new attenders and people who have not attended for a while. Again, the facilitator gathers and names the community, letting Friends know that they belong.
   3. I offer a brief opening reflection. I’ve noticed that it’s powerful to connect my opening reflection to the seasons or other cycles in nature.
   4. I introduce the group’s topic. This topic may connect to the imagery in the opening quote and/or reflection. If the opening silence is the threshold, then the topic is the gateway. It’s how we focus group members’ attention as a body and offer a shared direction for thoughts and feelings. Some recent topics in NFM groups have been “How do we build lives that can hold our suffering?” (tied into Lent) and “Daily experiences—including social experiences—that bring up grief and loss.” But the topic is only a suggestion. Group members may speak about anything that rises related to grief and loss.
   5. I read the Guidelines and Norms. I think a lot about providing structures or containers, which help group members feel safe and held. The idea of “the container” comes from clinical group therapy—among Friends, it’s so helpful that we already have Spirit as the container. When I facilitate in our community, I see my role as creating safe and clear structures so that Spirit can do its work.
   6. I invite group members to check in. In a regular CWL group, check-ins are more substantial than today’s: they comprise a “first round” during which most group members briefly introduce something they have been carrying that they will share more about later.
   7. I introduce queries related to the group’s topic. There are usually around three or four queries, which I paste into the chat. Again, group members may address these queries or other concerns.
   8. I hold a Meeting for Worship with Attention to Grief and Loss. This is the main course! How this part of the group works has been one of the biggest aha moments I’ve had in this experience. In secular grief groups, facilitators often enforce trauma-informed limits so that group members are not vicariously traumatized. But Friends are familiar with the practice of worship sharing. We already know the practice of creating space for all kinds of experiences, even ones that may be quite traumatic. I want to name this—it’s not a small thing. When Friends speak faithfully from the silence about grief and loss—and when other Friends leave enough space around their sharing—people report that their grief feels held. For the most part in our groups, Friends share as led; that sharing is held in the silence; and then another friend shares. There’s no need—for the most part—to respond directly to what was shared. That’s what is so unusual—and so transformational!—about a grief group grounded in Quaker faith and practice. What’s happening is an active communal practice of holding. With that said, what’s shared is often deeply painful. So in my experience, it’s felt important to have an elder in the group. The elder is present for spiritual and emotional tracking—and also so that if anything starts to go off the rails, there’s someone to step in and direct.
   9. At the same time, it’s deeply meaningful for Friends to know that they have been heard. So to mark the closing of the group, I briefly name the themes I heard that day, weaving them together so group members feel included in a larger tapestry or web.
   10. I invite a check-out. This means a brief word or phrase. The purpose here is containment and consolidation. What does this mean? Ideally, group members leave with an overview of what happened for them that day and also a sense that their experience continues to be held in the community as they leave. Also, I listen for the words people use. If someone checks out with a negative word, I will follow up with them within the next few days.
   11. I invite a brief closing silence—the threshold leading out of the shared experience of worship and back into the world.

   Joanna noted, “From 18 months of facilitating CWL groups, I’ve learned that grief can be held more easily if it is intimately witnessed. I think of this quote from nineteenth-century Friend Caroline Stephen: “We do not seek to escape suffering, but to find the life that can bear it.”

   Joanna Dalin graciously offered friends and members of Meetings to connect with her regarding implementation of the A Model of Care for Loss. Joanne is willing to share her PowerPoint slides and consult with Meetings interested in this unique way of offering spiritual support. Contact: Text: 413.230.0571 or email: email hidden; JavaScript is required

   This article was prepared by Sheila Sorkin, PYM Aging Support Coordinator to provide support, resources and engage the aging community of the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting and all Meetings as part of the “To Brighten Your Day” series.