Christmas is a time to get together with family and friends to rekindle relationships and try to bring good times and joy into our lives.
For those who have lost loved ones it’s a time to bring back memories of the person who has died to helps cope with the loss. But for many, talking about somebody who has died recently is an awkward subject they try to avoid.
“Our society doesn’t like to talk about death and dying and grief and loss and they don’t want to upset the person who is grieving, but it does help to talk about it,’ said Denise Torgerson, community program manager for the Prince George Hospice Palliative Care Society.
“People don’t want to upset the people who are grieving, but they want to talk about that person.”
Next Tuesday at 6:30 p.m. the Prince George Hospice Palliative Care Society Facebook page will go live with its Celebrate a Life Candle Lighting service, an annual ritual to remember loved ones who have died.
As part of the service, hospice staff and volunteers will recite poems, followed by a 30-second moment of silence to reflect on the person being remembered.
“It’s just a time for people who are grieving to come together with their family in front of their camera and spend a moment grieving and thinking about the person they have lost,” said Torgerson.
“There’s a lot of pressure at Christmas to be happy and be merry and for a lot of grievers that’s really difficult to do and it takes an enormous amount of energy. People are able to sit down and look at our Facebook page and devote a bit of time to missing that person and to acknowledging that relationship that is ongoing but in a different way, and then that moment of silence, that reflective moment of lighting a candle. It really helps to sustain people and takes that pressure off.”
Until 2020 the half-hour event held at a downtown church. The pandemic lockdown forced the switch to an online service, which allows people to participate anywhere they have internet service. Torgerson said the hospice might revisit making it an in-person event next year but will definitely continue it with the online Facebook Live connection.
