Activity time: 10 minutes

Go around in the circle and have participants share, one at a time, one word that describes an experience of death they have had. Be sure to advise that passing is an acceptable option. Share these closing words from Laine Bergeson's "Good Life, Good Death":

Death is like an unmapped land—a place our minds can't fully comprehend, but on the perimeters of which we are summoned to both new spiritual depths and sheer terror. Maybe our only call, both for ourselves and for our culture in denial, is to acknowledge this strange tension and learn to live with it. As others have noted, intelligence is the ability to hold two opposing ideas in mind at one time. Perhaps living an honest life means having the ability to do the same with death.

Extinguish the chalice.