Christmas presence

Helping the bereaved find meaning in loss is the lifeblood of the Archdiocese’s grief and consolation ministry

By Christina Gray

My mom died at Christmas last year. I remember lights twinkling in the darkness outside the window as I lay with her in the irrevocable silence. An empty syringe and a bottle of morphine sat on top of a stack of unopened holiday cards she would never read.

Ten months later, the changing light and leaves of my favorite season made me feel oddly uneasy, physically threatened somehow, angry, even.

“What we tell people is that your five senses are on high alert when you are grieving,” Mercy Sister Toni Lynn Gallagher, longtime coordinator of the grief and bereavement ministry for the Archdiocese of San Francisco, told me. I was approaching the season in which I had lost my favorite person on the planet.

Christmas is full of sensory memories

“The senses hold our memories,” she said in a compassionate hourlong conversation that was part interview, part personal grief support session. “Christmas is full of sensory memories.”

Grief is defined as the emotional and physical response to a loss, while bereavement is usually understood as the period of time in which someone experiences that grief.

Grief is a journey with no map and no time zone, said Sister Toni Lynn. Its nonlinear progression is the reason it can be so disorienting, whether the loss was 12 days, 12 months or 12 years ago. Add to that the fact that everyone grieves differently and at a different pace. “You can be walking along feeling just fine but suddenly you’re in tears for what seems like no reason,” she said.

You might have seen your loved one’s handwriting on an old gift tag. You heard a Christmas song your family sang together. The smell of a traditional holiday dish made you suddenly ache for the person who prepared it each year with love.

Grief and belief are not mutually exclusive

Christians are “not immune” to the emotions that attend a loss or the memory of a loss, according to Sister Toni Lynn. She and others who serve in grief support ministries agree that feelings of loss can resurface or become more pronounced during the Christmas season.

“Christmas is about love,” she said, the people you love and the people who love you. “After losing someone, where is the love between you supposed to go?

“Christians can sometimes feel guilty about the depth of their emotions after a loss,” she said. They may feel that if their faith is strong and true, it should override or temper feelings of sadness or despair or even anger.

“We are excited that Christ is coming again and that we are part of this wonderful story that has emanated throughout the centuries,” said Sister Toni Lynn. “But if we are grieving, that’s a really tough one.”

Deacon Chuck McNeil leads grief support-faith sharing groups at St. Dominic Parish in San Francisco.

“This is a place where death is put in the perspective of the Christian story,” he said. The death of a loved one is sad and can be a traumatic event, he said. But loss can also lead to a process of transformation and conversion. “It is about teaching the virtue of hope.”

Still, people of faith experience a range of feelings just like anyone else does, he said. He’s heard well-meaning Catholics tell friends or family members they should “snap out of it” because they are people of faith. Grief support groups are a place where grief and faith are not mutually exclusive.

“When a Catholic breaks a leg, it is still going to hurt,” he said.

Beverly Hibbs, a former suicide hotline worker, has offered grief support to the St. Isabella parish community for decades. She puts it this way: “Our Lord, I don’t believe he expects us to act happy all of the time. That’s just being human.”

Grief reminds us that we need each other

Sister Toni Lynn represents a network of parish-based Catholic grief support volunteers that function within her oversight under the auspices of the Office of Pastoral Ministry. Some of the most visible parish grief support ministries can be found at St. Mary’s Cathedral, St. Dominic’s Parish, St. Pius Parish and St. Veronica Parish.

“But in every single parish, great things are happening quietly,” she said.

A list of faith-based grief support groups, including one for those who have lost a loved one to suicide at St. Dominic’s, and one for those diagnosed with a life-threatening illness at St. Mary’s Cathedral, are listed at sfarch.org/grief.

Hospitals and fire and police departments within the Archdiocese have their own chaplaincy programs, according to Sister Toni Lynn, as does the restorative justice ministry.

Sister Toni Lynn’s own cell phone number, (415) 317-4436, effectively serves as the Archdiocese’s grief and bereavement hotline. As the chief for grief, she helps steer callers toward parish-based or other community resources that might best suit their needs.

Whether a parish offers a robust series of well-promoted grief support groups or the presence of a single volunteer, help is not limited to parishioners or defined by parish boundaries.

“We want to be very clear that all are welcome,” Catholic or non-Catholic, said Sister Toni Lynn. “You don’t have to be anyone other than someone acknowledging you need some help with grief.”

Her lifelong commitment to consoling the sorrowful (one of the seven spiritual works of mercy) took root when Sister Toni Lynn was a young sister serving the suffering families of a local parish during the Vietnam War.

“Grief reminds us that we really need each other,” she said. “Grief says, I can’t do this alone.”

Deacon Fred Totah, director of the Office of Pastoral Ministry, said pastors can’t be expected to personally or professionally treat a person’s grief and personal struggles, “but they should be able to respond pastorally and know what to do to get the person the help they need.”

“The simple act of listening is a reminder to us all that we are truly never alone in the light of God’s presence,” he said.

Christina Gray is the lead writer for Catholic San Francisco.