I’ve never been religious. Basking under the fragmented rays of an orange setting sun or feverish laughter drowning out an atonal chorus of cicadas are the closest I have come to genuine spirituality. I never really understood, or perhaps never tried to understand, authentic religiosity. I relished in the selfishness of my mundanity until my breath hitched over the dinner table as I was told that somebody I loved had died. In the desperate haze of the moment, the only coherent thought I strung together was, “Please, no.” This plea forced me to grapple with something I’d never considered within my staunch atheism: who was I talking to?
What does it mean for spirituality, to lose somebody? How does grief define our relationship with spirituality? Can loss push even the most devoted atheists to yearn for a higher power — some hope of reconnection? Or might it fracture the belief of the faithful, forcing them to question the reasoning behind such tragedy?
For those who do believe, grief may have paradoxical effects. Loss doesn’t always draw people closer to spirituality; it can drive them away. A lifetime of faith may be undone in a single moment of pain. A study conducted by Waylor University found that two major patterns occur when religious individuals are faced with immeasurable loss: “positive religious coping”, when individuals turn to the comfort of faith within grief, and “negative religious coping”, where individuals denounce religion in bereavement, through “appraising God … spiritual discontentment, and disengagement from religious involvement.” It was found that loss has a commonly negative effect on the frequency in which individuals attend religious services and engage in religious practices. This suggests a quiet unravelling of faith against the tidal wave of grief. In his book A Grief Observed British writer C.S. Lewis detailed his jumbled fall from Christian spirituality after the death of his wife, asking plainly, “Where is God?” He described his loss of faith as if being deadlocked out of the comfort of a once warm and vibrant house. “There are no lights in the windows,” he explained. “It might be an empty house. Was it ever inhabited?”
However, grief does not always exile people from the house of faith. In Buddhism, the process of death is lovingly and faithfully ritualised, encouraging grief and faithful spiritualism to occur simultaneously. The belief in samsara (the cyclical nature of individual consciousness gaining new life after death) understands death as a process of transition and continuation, rather than a final moment or a complete end. Instead of viewing death as a finality, it becomes a spiritual opportunity for growth and liberation. This understanding transforms the grieving process into one of compassionate accompaniment, where spiritual rituals such as chanting and meditation not only aid the deceased through their rebirth, but also provide structure, solace, and clarity for the living. When grief is not suppressed or denied, the impermanent nature of existence may be embraced, placing bereavement as a natural process in the broader journey toward faithful enlightenment.
Although, it may not just be a specific god or ritual that people turn to in the face of loss. Subtle, everyday reminders of the person you lost may turn into a sign of a higher existence, or proof of meaning after death. The date of a lost loved one’s birthday lazing gracefully on the end of a barcode number, the barista making your morning coffee wearing their name on a name-tag, the melody of their favourite song drifting through the speakers as you reach for sourdough in the Bakery Section in Woolworths. It is in this intense grief that you may begin to believe in invisibility. Like the promise of a heavenly God or the transcendence of Nirvana, it lifts you gently and reminds you how to live. The warm hand of faith caresses the rotten hand of grief, offering the promise of eternal love even in the midst of perpetual, tear-stained darkness.
Whether it be a solidified higher identity, or the quiet acknowledgement of a beautiful life now lost, grief manifests paradoxically and incomprehensibly in the warm beating heart between our rib cages. It thrashes and bites and kisses and cries softly and begs for forgiveness. It is indescribable and turbulent, and so is fractured spirituality. There is not one ‘right’ or ‘common’ way to deal with grief. Your loved one is waiting for you with outstretched hands in some intangible place, beyond what you can currently see, or they have returned to the ground beneath you, and they raise the daisies you make flower crowns out of in spring. Whether they have returned to the stars of which they were created, or ascended the pearly gates, they are not lost if you believe in them.
