Fox Valley group honors children who have died

Submitted by Fox Valley Chapter of The Compassionate Friends

Members of the Fox Valley Chapter of The Compassionate Friends will participate in an annual worldwide event designed to honor the memories of all children, regardless of age, who have died.

The chapter is joining Sunday, Dec. 11, with hundreds of organized memorial services around the world for The Compassionate Friends’ 15th annual Worldwide Candle Lighting.

The local candle lighting will be part of a special service at 6:30 p.m. at Provena Mercy Center Hospital in front of the three-story brick Behavioral Health building facing Lake Street/Route 31. It will feature refreshments and special readings.

Annually, tens of thousands of families, united in loss, light candles for one hour during the Worldwide Candle Lighting, held the second Sunday in December. Candles are first lit at 7 p.m., local time, just west of the international date line. As candles burn down in one time zone, they are lighted in the next, creating a 24-hour wave of light as the observance continues around the world.

“This is our gift to the bereavement community,” said TCF/USA Executive Director Patricia Loder. “Members of our more than 630 chapters observe this day in differing ways, some alone, some with friends and family, and many in organized candle lighting ceremonies like the service planned by the Fox Valley chapter of The Compassionate Friends. We invite everyone, whether or not they have suffered the personal loss of a child, to join in this moving tribute.”

TCF’s national website, www.compassionatefriends.org, is expected to receive and post information on more than the 550 services submitted to and listed on its website last year.

The website also will have a Remembrance Book Dec. 11, which, in a 24-hour-period, will receive thousands of tributes from family members and other individuals.

To contact the Fox Valley Chapter of The Compassionate Friends, call Sherry at (630) 553-2132.