Below is a tribute from Michael’s friend Jordan Perry: Michael Dowd lived a life of love in action and he thrived in the thrill of being alive! On Saturday October 7, while in his sleep, he returned to the infinite joy that he had never left. Michael died in New York where he went to … Read moreRemembering Ecotheologian Michael Dowd (November 19, 1958 – October 7, 2023)
Co-founded by Karen Elizabeth Bishop and David Sherman, The Elegy Project: The Project also includes a curriculum of courses on Modern Elegy, Ode and Elegy and Inventing Farewell: A Practicum on Elegy.
In this article for the BBC, Becca Warner explores a variety of ecologically sustainable funeral options: “In the face of death, we seek consolation. And it’s been really interesting seeing how there’s been a conflict, in some cases, between what is sustainable and what people find consoling,” she says. Bags of bone ash and compost … Read more“How to plan a sustainable funeral”
B. David Zarley writes for Freethink on the subject of psychedelic therapies for dying people: “Existential distress” of the kind faced by people at the end of their lives is not a mental health disorder you’ll find in the DSM-V, points out Paul Thielking, a board certified doctor in palliative and hospice medicine and the … Read more“Psychedelics are helping dying patients overcome their existential distress”
Kate Lindsay writes for The Atlantic on digital afterlives: As the author Marisa Renee Lee noted in this magazine last year, “Grief is the repeated experience of learning to live after loss.” Today, with our ever-expanding digital and technological reach, loved ones left behind must encounter more reminders of that loss than ever before. Memory endures through … Read more“The Experience of Grief Is Changing”
A fascinating documentary on the folklore of the Accabadora (’Lady of Kind Death’) in Sardinia, Italy, where – according to rumor – there existed a tradition of compassionate euthanasia carried out by a special class of women.
Click here to read Eva Holland’s excellent essay on the lives and intentional deaths of Alaskan artists Eric and Pam Bealer (note that the story is also available as a professionally-read audio-essay): Below their declaration was a passage attributed to Richard Bach, which said: “Why, instead of suffering and fighting it, don’t people reach a … Read more“The Frontier Couple Who Chose Death Over Life Apart”
Zoe Williams writes for The Guardian: You might get lucky with what they call “compressed morbidity”, a very short period of illness before you die, but you probably won’t. You might, in the event, find the suffering less awful than it looks, in which case you will, of course, retain the right to die in … Read more“Assisted dying is on nobody’s bucket list – but preventing it is deeply unjust”