BELOVED is committed to embracing the mental health community and partnering to shine a light on mental health and mental illness.
We join community events throughout the year benefiting organizations like the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI), Survivors of Suicide Loss (SOSL), the San Diego Pride parade, and more, with the intention of breaking the stigma around mental health challenges and offering a prayerful and compassionate presence. Whenever we host a table or booth at these events, we invite attendees to add a link to our prayer chain by selecting a colored strip of paper, writing down their prayer, and connecting it to the others. We create a sacred space and time to lift up our experiences, silently joining together in prayer.
By the end of the day, the prayer chain is long, colorful, and sacred — a tangible example of the Holy Spirit at work!
When BELOVED was first organizing as a new church, we knew we wanted to build a meaningful connection with the mental health community. Rather than being a church that silences mental health struggles, like depression, bipolar disorder, anxiety, panic attacks, and suicidal thoughts and attempts, we wanted to be a church community that actively works to integrate spiritual, physical, mental and emotional wellness.
We started out by hosting a resource table at the San Diego American Federation for Suicide Prevention Out of Darkness Walk. As we imagined what we might do at the event, we were inspired by AFSP’s practice of inviting participants to wear colored beads, with each color representing a different relationship to suicide (e.g. white = loss of a child, red = loss of a spouse). The beads allowed people to share their experience without saying a word, inviting connection between those with the same colors.
We adapted this idea to creating a prayer chain with colored strips to represent different experiences. We worried that people might resist the idea or think we were suggesting prayer as a way to stop their suffering.
But one by one, they came. Many would ask, “How do I do this?” and we would show them the color chart and make suggestions for what they could write. Others would silently choose a colored strip matching the beads around their necks and begin writing and writing. Often they would turn to someone they were with and melt into sobs. When we saw the color they chose, we knew more about the pray-er, too.
Little did we know at that time the chain reaction that was ignited!
