Ritual can be very comforting. I sat with an eight-year-old today as she prepared to bury her father discussing why we cut kriah (the tear in our clothes or a ribbon worn at the death of an immediate relative). I also got to hold her doll for a bit. The doll is as much part of her ritual as the cutting would be. This doll (I believe her name is Sarah) visited Michael (the father) in the hospital. She will accompany the family to Camp Ramah this summer, and Israel, as the family goes to celebrate a bat mitzvah. Sarah knows all the places Michael told the kids to visit.
Later, I watched this same eight-year-old bury her father. It should have been gut-wrentching, but it wasn't. There she was, holding a shovel along with three other girls her age. Together they had embraced the ritual, and were fulfilling this last mitzvah together. Somehow, together, standing at the edge of the grave, these girls transformed ritual action into healing, an act of selfless care for a father lost, and an act of support and comfort for a friend in need. They were some of the first shovelling, and they were the last, scrapping even the last grains of soil into the grave (just to make sure it was done right).
Even later I sat with this family and asked if there was any message they wanted sent to their classes, where I'd be speaking in the morning. The message, just come and be. It's the ritual of shiva that so few know. As adults, we try to fill the emptiness. We try to help. We are supposed to come, to sit, and to just wait. I hope the message can get from the children to their parents.
As we were leaving our oldest suggested that our havurah all come to help get the family up from shiva. He felt we're their community, and as such we all need to be there. He's right, and sometimes so wise.
God is in these moments, and God is in these children.
Hamakom yinachem otam btoch sha'ar avlei Tzion vIrushalyim. May God comfort them among the mourners of Zion and Jerusalem (and us too).
