Reflections from the crossroads of death, Judaism, and social distancing.
If you’re visiting this site, it’s probably because you or someone you know has suffered the loss of a friend or loved one recently. Before we on the RemoteShiva volunteer team say anything else about this blog, we just want to say: we’re so, so sorry for your loss. We know you’re in pain, and we know COVID-19 is making your life even more difficult. We want this site to be a resource for you as you navigate a mourning journey that has likely been complicated by the restrictions of COVID-19.
With that in mind, in addition to offering the RemoteShiva organizing app (which is still under construction as of this writing), we are launching the RemoteShiva blog. This blog is a community platform for people who have been through the process of grieving online or remotely to share their reflections with those who are trying to figure out how to navigate their own loss. Because everyone’s experience of loss and mourning is so radically different, our goal for the blog is to include posts from as diverse a collection of authors as possible so that everyone can find a post here that speaks to them. We hope to share words from Jews of all genders, races, and religious denominations. We will include the voices of those who have lost loved ones themselves alongside the voices of clergy and supportive community members.
We hope this blog will help guide those who are working through the awkward, challenging, and emotionally fraught questions about how to cope with death online in a Jewish way. While in no way exhaustive, contributors to this blog will tackle questions like:
How has the emotional journey of losing my loved one been impacted by physical distancing?
What worked well when we moved our mourning practice online? What didn’t?
How have we combined in-person and digital mourning practices together?
How have rabbis and other clergy been supportive? How have they not?
What has been the hardest about mourning online?
How have I been surprised by the consequences of mourning in the context of COVID-19?
We’re grateful to our first contributing writers to the blog, and we admire their courage in sharing their experiences with you all. We hope their words are helpful to you. We also invite you to join them in sharing your thoughts here. Please reach out to gene@remoteshiva.org if you’re interested in writing or being interviewed about your experiences.
With our warmest wishes,
The RemoteShiva Team