Our country has been thrown into mourning once again this week with the shooting in Orlando. Once again the news is inundated with musings on motive, questions about how this could have been prevented, harrowing stories of survivors, and the names of too many dead. Once again we gather in vigils and rallies, hoping, praying that we won’t be doing this again six months from now. Once again we declare “enough.”

Once again, I’ve been wondering about how it affects us all to live in this era in which mass shootings are all too commonplace. We live in this time of constant second-hand trauma through news reports and Facebook feeds. We live in this time of fear, and we wonder: where will it be next? Who will it be next? And each time, we remember all the other times. We think again of those planes crashing in to the twin towers, the faces of the children lost at Sandy Hook, that day of lockdown after the Boston Marathon bombings. We live these moments again and again and again.

And so this week we grieve again all those deaths. We grieve for the city of Orlando, for the families and friends of those who died. We grieve for our LGBTQ siblings, targeted once again by violence in this month usually filled with Pride parades and celebration. We grieve for our Latinx siblings, targeted once again in a country that is already wracked by too much racism. We grieve again for our Muslim siblings, for the inevitable increase in Islamophobia in the days and weeks to come. We grieve again for all those who have been lost over the years to gun violence, hatred and fear.

And this week we begin again the work of rebuilding—rebuilding our trust in one another, rebuilding our faith in the world, rebuilding our hope for a different tomorrow.

This week, I invite you to be gentle with yourselves. Make room for the grief, yes, and the anger, and even the fear, but also make sure you make room for love. Turn off the radio or the TV, give yourself a break from Facebook and Twitter and hold the hand of someone you love. Make space this week for tears, yes, but also for laughter and hugs. Remember what it is to be alive, and fortify yourself with love. For we have a long road ahead of us to end this era of fear and violence, to usher in an era of love and compassion. There is work to do. May we begin ourselves. May we begin again in love.

With Love & Blessings,

Allison