Faith, religious rituals help survivors navigate grief after painful loss

(Editor's note: If you or someone you know needs help navigating grief, visit griefresourcenetwork.com/crisis-center/hotlines/ to find a comprehensive list of hotlines and other resources.)

About five years ago, 40-year-old Anas Roumany was on his commute home from work in Syria when he was hit and killed by a grenade.

His niece, Razan Roumany, then a sophomore in high school, said she was shocked to learn of her uncle's passing. Because of Syria's ongoing conflict, Razan said her family was unable to return to Syria at the time of his death.

"It's not something you think would happen to you," Razan said of the tragedy.

Razan grew up in Cape Girardeau and attends school at Southeast Missouri State University. The Muslim student is studying biology and Spanish, intends to earn a master's degree in interpreting and regularly attends prayer services at the Islamic Center on West End Boulevard.

Anas' death occurred during Ramadan, a monthlong observance of fasting, reflection and prayer for Muslims, who don't eat or drink from sun up until sun down during Ramadan.

It was then, during what is an already heightened time of reflection, that Razan said she began to question her faith.

"I started to question, you know, if God exists, then why do all these horrible things happen, and why does he let all these horrible things happen?" Razan asked. "I realized that human beings make a choice. ... We can choose to be evil, or we can choose to be good."

She likened her grieving process to that of strengthening the body.

"Tou have to break down those muscles in order to make them stronger," she said. "If somebody's at the gym, they're not necessarily having fun, it's not necessarily a pleasurable thing, but you grow out of it."

Razan, eldest of four children, has two brothers and a sister, Shadan, who also attends SEMO. Razan said she felt a responsibility to help her younger siblings through the tragedy.

In Islamic tradition, Muslims pray five times a day, the intervals of which are often dictated by the position of the sun. But the structure of that prayer time, Razan said, helped her navigate the grief of her family's loss.

"You're forced to drop everything, and that's just your time with God," Razan said.

'Everybody is the same'

Tahsin Khalid, an Imam for the Islamic Center and professor of elementary, early and special education at SEMO, said he schedules his day around the five times of prayer. It also gives him a break in the day, and the walk to the mosque helps give him some exercise.

"I feel a good stretch when I do it this way," Khalid said, bending to demonstrate the 90-degree angle at which he bows for prayer. "It gives me a break, and when I come back, I'm ready to work again."

Muslims may often bury their dead as soon as possible after the death has occurred, Khalid explained, typically within 24 or 48 hours. There is also an Islamic tradition of washing the body and wrapping it in white cloth, he said.

"Everybody is the same now, [while] going towards the God," Tahsin said of death. "So, you're all [wrapped] in two white cloths whether you were a billionaire or you were poor."

When his mother was dying last year, Bruce Gentry said he spent several days by her side in Alabama. The professor of religion and director of the Baptist Student Center at SEMO remembered what one of the hospice nurses did for his mother's body.

"After she died, the hospice nurse washed her body and just kind of wrapped it like she was in bed asleep," Gentry said. "And that was just a beautiful thing after all this trauma."

Gentry said the act brought him and his family some comfort.

"None of us would have thought to do that," Gentry said. "But for this lady who does it all the time, it was like her gift to us."

Gentry said practicing the rituals of a religion may be a way one's faith can help navigate grief.

"[Religion] guides you into ritual to acknowledge death and what has happened and to kind of move you along to work through it," Gentry said.

In other cultures and religious traditions, funeral rituals look different.

Some spend significant time in mourning, such as shiva, a seven-day period in which a Jewish family grieving a death will be released from religious obligations, visiting friends may bring or share in food and tell stories of the person who has died. Not every family will sit shiva all seven days; some may observe the mourning period for a lesser time appropriate to their needs.

Gentry, who teaches world religion courses, said the Iroquois tribes had "interesting mourning rituals" related to war.

"If you had a son killed in war, the mother or the wife would grieve in front of her home for so many days, almost like the Biblical idea of sackcloth and ashes," Gentry said. "And if that didn't work, then the actual community would send out a war party to kidnap somebody to bring them back to kind of replace them."

Major world religions may share some commonalities in ideology or death rituals but have different ideas about what actually happens to a person after death.

"Hindus tend to believe you have a particular soul called the 'atman,' [and] they believe in reincarnation," Gentry said. "So your karma builds up either good or bad, and so you can kind of come back as something lesser or something greater. [It's] kind of an evolutionary idea."

In many indigenous, Asian, Japanese and other Eastern religions, Gentry said, is the idea of ancestors who remain. "[The idea is] that they're still involved in your life."

'Punishments of God'

Toward the end of last year, La Croix United Methodist Church teaching pastor, the Rev. Brett Cheek led a sermon series on grief. On Nov. 10, Cheek spoke on God's faithfulness in times of loss, and the ways in which people often struggle to process grief.

"I do not know of a single thing in our culture that we avoid more actively than grief and loss," Cheek said. "Jesus didn't run from the pain; he let in the truth that life is tragic and God is faithful."

He went on to explain an unorthodox understanding of grief: that it may actually be "a gift from God" because experiencing loss means one first had to have the capacity to love.

"Grief is what love looks like in the absence of the thing that you love," Cheek said.

The Rev. Dave Conley, senior pastor of Centenary United Methodist Church, explained an idea many struggle with when they are faced with loss, grief, death or tragedy: If God is real, how could he let tragedy happen?

"To oversimplify -- although not by much -- suffering and pain and evil and death are consequences of living in an unfinished creation," Conley wrote in a Thursday email to the Southeast Missourian. "Genesis 1 describes the beginning of creation, and God pronounces it to be very good, although God does not declare creation to be perfect."

Conley wrote the story of the cross reveals to believers today the depth of God's love and "willingness to suffer with us," while the resurrection reveals God's power to redeem and overcome the limitations of a creation still unfinished.

Asked what he believes is the purpose of religion, Conley said religion is an approach to life and a way to orient life to "the gift of the unfolding future" rather than to try and grasp the past.

"In doing that, religion helps us find meaning in life, although as human beings, we are not capable of grasping the meaning of life," Conley wrote. "It can certainly guide us toward the good; however, it can also be misused and do great damage."

Posed the same question, Khalid shared passages from the Quran, which guide the faithful to patience and prayer in times of hardship.

"As a Muslim, for me, religion is everything," Khalid said. "When you talk about the purpose of religion, it's two-fold. One is, we worship the God, and the other one is, we become good humans."

And when tragedy strikes, Khalid said, that may be a sign from God that a person is being tested in his or her faith.

"When calamity comes to you, be patient," Khalid said. "And look at people who are suffering more than you do, and that gives you a little [perspective]."

From a Christian perspective, Conley wrote faith's role in navigating grief may be entering into a trust that life has meaning, purpose and value.

"This in no way is meant to lessen the reality and pain of loss and grief," Conley said. "Jesus wept when his friend Lazarus died, even though he had the power to resuscitate him ... indicating that loss, no matter for how long, is inseparable from grief."

In his message, Cheek went on to detail the gifts grief may be able to offer a person.

"Grief helps us honor things that matter," Cheek said. "Second of all, grief helps us build compassion. I can enter into your pain if I have felt my own."

It's also helps build relationships, he said. "Anything that forces you to say, 'I need help,' is a gift from the Father," Cheek said. "Even Jesus said, 'I need help,' to his friends."

Part 5 will publish Jan. 26 and focus on rediscovering life after loss.