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“A grieving process allows us to heal. When we deny that process, that’s when the numbness sets in. Then beyond that we start feeling symptoms of anxiety, and beyond that — depression,” said Whaley-Perkins. “So it’s really important for people who are vulnerable or have previous traumas that you don’t wait to see if it’s going to go away. Healing is extraordinarily important.”AdvertisementAccording to Whaley-Perkins, a community should be a group of people that provide safety, can be trusted, and where one can be vulnerable with their feelings. For many in Philadelphia, where they practice their faith is also where communities resides.

“Unless we change fundamentally how we educate our society, unfortunately people will still find a way to do these things,” said Shemtov. “We are all different — but we were all created by God with a purpose. Everybody has to start where they can start. If you’re not in the position to make national or local change, we can all change how we treat ou

As the country reckons with how to move forward, interfaith leaders in Philadelphia look to balance healing with collective action. To Chad Dion Lassiter, who is a national race relations expert and executive director of Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission, taking care of oneself, of one’s community, and finding the motivation to take action are made possible by taking the healing process seriously.

ban on assault weapons while attending the funeral of Ruth Whitfield, an 86-year-old killed in a mass shooting in Buffalo, New York, on 14 May. The attack at a supermarket in a predominantly black neighbourhood is believed to have been racially motivated. The teenaged suspect had also legally bought an AR-15-style weapon.

"He can't bring her back. He can't bring none of them back and nobody can," she told the BBC earlier on Sunday.

More than one million people have died from Covid, a once unimaginable figure

An increase in drug deaths, combined with Covid, has led overall life expectancy in America to decline to a degree not seen since World War II.

Police killings of unarmed Black men continue long past vows for reform.

“You can’t underestimate the need for belonging,” she said. When something terrible happens, people want to connect with their “in-group,” she said, where they feel they belong, which can push people further into partisan camps.

Rabbi Mychal B. Springer, the manager of clinical pastoral education at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital, has found herself returning to an ancient Jewish writing in the Mishnah, which says that when God began creating, God created a single person.

“The teaching is, each person is so precious that the whole world is contained in that person, and we have to honor that person completely and fully,” she said. “If a single person dies, the whole world dies, and if a single person is saved, then the whole world is saved.”

We can only value life if we are willing to truly grieve, to truly face the reality of suffering

“It’s not that we don’t care. We’ve reached the limit of how much we can cry and hurt,” she said. “And yet we have to. We have to value each life as a whole world, and be willing to cry for what it means that that whole world has been lost.”

The mountain of calamities, and the paralysis over how to overcome it, points to a nation struggling over some fundamental questions: Has our tolerance as a country for such horror grown, dusting off after one event before moving on to the next? How much value do we place in a single human life?

Valuing life and working for healing means going outside of one’s self, and one’s own group, she said.

“This will require collective action,” she said. “And part of the problem is we are very divided right now.”

American culture often prizes individual liberty above collective needs. But ultimately humans are born to care about others and to not turn away,

“Human beings are born for meaning,” she said. “We have very, very large souls. We are born for generosity, we are born for compassion.”

What is standing in the way of a proper valuation of life, she said, is “our very, very disordered relationship with death.”

n the United States, denial of death has reached an extreme form, she said, where many focus on themselves to avoid the fear of death.

That fear cuts through “all tendrils of conscience, and common good, and capacity to act together,” she said, “because in the final analysis we have become animals saving our own skin, the way we seem to save our own skin is repression and dissociation.”

The United States is an outlier in the level of gun violence it tolerates. The rate and severity of mass shootings is without parallel in the world outside conflict zones.America has “a love affair with violence,”

Violence is an almost a normal part of life in the United States, she said, and valuing life takes consistently asking how am I committed to nonviolence today? It also means giving some things up, she said — many people think of themselves as nonviolent, but consume violence in entertainment.

“The question that should scare us is, what will it take to make us collectively bring about this change?

“Maybe this is our life’s work,” she said. “Maybe this is our work as humans.”

“But when I slow down I realize there is something alive in our culture that has harmed those people,” she said. “Whatever that something is, it is harming all of us, we are all vulnerable to it, it wields some sort of influence upon us, no matter who we are.”

Think about the lives lost.Think about the teachers.Think about the children.They were family, friends, and loved ones.And a gun killed them all.It was only last week that we posted a similar prompt in response to the racist massacre in Buffalo. Like all of our student forums, this one will be moderated.

Students might find their own ways to respond, perhaps through writing or art. It may also be helpful to look at how victims of other tragedies have been memorialized, in ways big and small. For example: The 26 playgrounds built to remember the children of Sandy Hook; the memorial for the Oklahoma City bombing, with its “field of chairs,” including 19 smaller ones for the children who lost their lives; and the New York Times Portraits of Grief series, which profiled those lost in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Here are more examples, from the El Paso Times. In what ways can your students or school respond, individually or collectively?

Above all, we want you to know we are listening. If it helps your students to share their thoughts and feelings publicly, we have a space for that. And if teachers or parents have thoughts, ideas, questions, concerns or suggestions, please post them here.

The authors of the 2018 Times article described how the Parkland shooting moved students around the country to become more involved in activism. Do you think something similar will happen in the wake of the shooting in Uvalde, Texas? Why or why not? How do you think school shootings are shaping the generation of students who are in school right now?Invite your students to weigh in here.

Democrats moved quickly to clear the way for votes on legislation to strengthen background checks for gun purchasers. Republicans, even as they expressed horror about the shooting, did not signal that they would drop their longstanding opposition to gun safety measures. Gov. Greg Abbott of Texas pointed the blame at Uvalde’s lack of mental health care, even though the suspect had no record of problems.

Which efforts might be the most effective? Students might also take a look at the forum on guns we posted during the 2016 election as part of our Civil Conversation Challenge in which we invited teenagers to have productive, respectful conversations on several issues dividing Americans. We received more than 700 responses to the questions we posed about gun rights, the Second Amendment and more.

This article takes on three of the most prominent rumors that have spread via online platforms such as Twitter, Gab, 4chan and Reddit and explains why they are false. What rumors are your students seeing in their feeds, and what steps can they take to find out the truth? From double-checking via sites like Snopes to learning habits like lateral reading, this article (and related lesson plan) has suggestions.

While the town of Uvalde grapples with the aftermath of the shooting, community members, local leaders and organizations have mobilized. Two local funeral homes said in social media posts that they would not charge families of victims for their funeral services. Volunteers have lined up to give blood for the shooting victims.

Two years ago, after the deadliest mass shooting in Canada’s history took place in Nova Scotia, his government banned military-style assault weapons. Last week, it carried out previously announced firearms record-keeping regulations.

As of May 18, Canadians who purchase a nonrestricted firearm, basically a rifle or shotgun, must provide identification as well as a valid firearms license. Businesses are required to keep these records, which may be viewed by the police with a warrant.

“Conservatives very much associate themselves now with the opposition to gun control, but that wasn’t always the case,” Blake Brown, a history professor at Saint Mary’s University in Halifax, told me. He said that Liberals and Conservatives passed firearms control measures in the 1950s and 1960s, and that both parties strengthened Canada’s gun laws in the years following the 1989 Montreal massacre.

“Certainly there have been periods in American history where they’ve been more aggressive in gun control than in Canada,” he said. “But, overall, the trend has been that Canada has seen themselves differently when it comes to firearms.” That has led to stricter gun laws amid fears of importing American gun violence.

It found that shotguns and rifles in Canada’s illegal market generally enter the system through legal purchases. That’s unlike illicit handguns, it said, which tend to be smuggled into Canada.

Since there is no systemic data collection on the origins of crime guns, one internal Statistics Canada presentation I read emphatically placed it in the “What we don’t know” category.

Without gun tracing and better data, the full picture of the United States’ effect on gun crimes in Canada will remain incomplete and based on haphazardly-tracked incidents like that of the gun-toting drone.

Leaders in the deeply conservative Utah say they need the law to protect women's sports. As cultural shifts raise LGBTQ visibility, the lawmakers argue that, without their intervention, more transgender athletes with apparent physical advantages could eventually dominate the field and change the nature of women's sports.

he team is also partially owned by NBA all-star Dwyane Wade, who has a transgender daughter.

The looming threat of a lawsuit worries school districts and the Utah High School Athletic Association, which has said it lacks the funds to defend the policy in court. Later Friday, lawmakers are expected to change the bill so state money would cover legal fees.

The group Visit Salt Lake, which hosts conferences, shows and events, said the override could cost the state $50 million in lost revenue. The Utah-based DNA-testing genealogy giant Ancestry.com also urged the Legislature to find another way. The American Principles Project is confident that states with bans won't face boycotts like North Carolina did after limiting public restrooms transgender people could use. It focused on legislation in populous, economic juggernaut states like Texas and Florida that would be harder to boycott, Schilling said.

Friday's deliberations came after more than a year of debate and negotiation between social conservatives and LGBTQ advocates. Republican sponsor Rep. Kera Birkeland worked with Cox and civil rights activists at Equality Utah before introducing legislation that would require transgender student-athletes to go before a government-appointed commission.

The proposal, although framed as a compromise, failed to gain traction on either side. LGBTQ advocates took issue with Republican politicians appointing commission members and evaluation criteria that included body measurements such as hip-to-knee ratio.

But the ban won support from a vocal conservative base that has particular sway in Utah's state primary season. Even with primaries looming, however, some Republicans stood with Cox to reject the ban.

Ready for more bad infectious diseases news? There's an outbreak of bird flu making its way into U.S. poultry flocks. If the virus continues to spread, it could affect poultry prices — already higher amid widespread inflation. The price of chicken breasts this week averaged $3.63 per pound at U.S. supermarkets — up from $3.01 a week earlier and $2.42 at this time last year, the Agriculture Department says.

The latest data from the USDA show 59 confirmed sites of avian flu across commercial and backyard flocks in 17 states since the start of the year. That figure includes chickens, turkey and other poultry. The USDA identified a case of avian flu in a wild bird in mid-January, the first detection of the virus in wild birds in the U.S. since 2016. Wild birds can spread the virus to commercial and backyard flocks. By Feb. 9, the virus had been identified in a commercial flock in Indiana.

The last major avian flu outbreak in the U.S. was from December 2014 to June 2015, when more than 50 million chickens and turkeys either died from highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) or were destroyed to stop its spread.

Whether the 2022 avian flu will affect the price of eggs and poultry depends on how widespread it becomes, says Ron Kean, a poultry science expert at the University of Wisconsin-Madison Department of Animal and Dairy Sciences. "In 2015, we did see quite an increase in egg prices," Kean told Wisconsin Public Radio. "The chicken meat wasn't severely affected at that time. We did see quite a loss in turkeys, so turkey prices went up. So, we'll see. If a lot of farms contract this, then we could see some real increases in price."

For producers who suspect their flock may be affected by avian flu, the USDA has a guide to the warning signs, including a sudden increase in bird deaths, lack of energy and appetite, and a decrease in egg production. If a flock is found to be infected by bird flu, the USDA moves quickly — within 24 hours — to assist producers to destroy the flock and prevent the virus from spreading.

A new Virginia state law prohibiting mask mandates in public schools does not apply to 12 students with disabilities whose parents challenged the law, a federal judge has ruled. Last month, the parents of 12 students across Virginia asked the court to halt enforcement of the law, saying it violated their rights under the federal American with Disabilities Act. The law, signed by newly elected Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin, went into effect March 1; it gives parents a say over whether their children should wear masks in school.

The group of parents have children whose health conditions range from cystic fibrosis to asthma that put them at heightened risk for COVID-19.

The American Civil Liberties Union, which was one of several legal organizations that filed on behalf of the plaintiffs, said the injunction served as a "blueprint."

In a statement, Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares said the ruling affirms that "parents have the right to make choices for their children."

When Judge Katanji Brown Jackson entered the Senate chamber this week to face questions on her readiness to join the Supreme Court, she did so as the first Black woman in the nation's history to be nominated to that position. For many Black law students and professionals, including a group of 150 who traveled from across the country to watch the historic hearing, Jackson's rise to likely associate justice gives a message of profound hope for what they too might one day be able to accomplish.

Dudley was one of 100 law students selected nationwide to attend a series of events and watch parties for Jackson's nomination, hosted by the progressive organization, Demand Justice. The group also included 50 public defenders — a nod to Jackson's own background in that field. "I see a lot of myself in her. I see a lot of my friends in her, and I wanted to be there to support," Dudley said, calling Jackson "overly qualified to sit on the Supreme Court."

The cohort of legal professionals cheered on Jackson as she faced questions from Republicans about her past cases, particularly those relating to child sex abuse, and on what school of thought she would bring to determining the constitutionality of high-profile cases. Republicans had vowed to oppose President Joe Biden's nominees to the court, and when news of Justice Stephen Breyer's imminent retirement broke, the GOP quickly mobilized to attack potential nominees who might replace the longtime liberal justice on the bench.

Particularly, some sentencing decisions in child pornography cases drew GOP fire. But Jackson's measured responses throughout the three days of questioning solidified the support of many onlookers, who reveled in what it would mean to have a Black woman sit on the bench for the first time in the court's 233-year history. "The fact of the matter is that I'm the father of three black girls, right? And to be able to tell them that finally, someone who is Black — female nonetheless — is finally on the precipice of a mountain that has never been climbed before by any other Black woman, is huge," said Edrius Stagg, a third-year law student at Southern University Law Center in Baton Rouge.

Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia — whose break from Democrats on a number of politically fraught votes had worried some as to whether he would support Biden's nominee — announced on Friday he would vote in favor of Jackson's confirmation, all but assuring her path to join the bench.

For some, the optics of seeing Jackson — a Black woman — defend her credentials to a group of largely white, predominantly male detractors, was a familiar scene. It has played out, students said, in workplaces the world over and across the socioeconomic spectrum.

Booker called the attacks on Jackson's record "dangerous" and "disingenuous," noting the complexities of cases that had been boiled down to their basest points in order to damage Jackson's image.

"I'm not gonna let my joy be stolen," he continued. "Because I know, you and I, we appreciate something that we get that a lot of my colleagues don't." And while Jackson's opponents peppered her with politically polarizing questions, her supporters grew even more convinced that Jackson was qualified for the job. "To see her hold her composure and just answer the questions just to the best of her capabilities was just really great to see," said Jasmine McMillion, a third-year law student at Florida Agricultural and Mechanical University College of Law.

As for our continuing distress, the standard explanation is a uniquely American loneliness. The surgeon general, Vivek Murthy, declared it an epidemic in its own right.

The truth, however, is there’s no good evidence that Americans are lonelier than ever

a major recent poll shows that older Americans are now significantly less lonely than they were three years ago; a recent peer-reviewed study reports that middle-aged Americans describe themselves as less lonely than they were 20 years ag

Loneliness is more pervasive among younger Americans, but there too, the rates have also plummeted since 2020

Logically, we should be feeling better. Why can’t we shake this thing?

loneliness was never the core problem. It was, rather, the sense among so many different people that they’d been left to navigate the crisis on their own. How do you balance all the competing demands of health, money, sanity?

The answer was always the same: Figure it out.

while other countries built trust and solidarity, America — both during and after 2020 — left millions to fend for themselves.

For millions of Americans, distrust feels like the most rational state.

The very different people I spoke with that year all had one thing in common: a feeling that in the wake of Covid, all the larger institutions they had been taught to trust had failed them. At the most precarious times in their lives, they found there was no system in place to help.

four years later, the situation is, if anything, worse.

Nursing homes across the country, where poor labor conditions were linked to higher Covid mortality levels, remain understaffed, leaving old, frail residents more vulnerable than they should be. Hunger and food insecurity remain wrenching emergencies.

Students haven’t fully returned to school. Congress passed the Child Poverty Reduction Act of 2021, one of the most effective antipoverty measures in decades. Then a year later, Congress ended it, pushing some five million young people back down into extreme financial need.

When everything was uncertain and everyone’s future was on the line, we walked right up to the precipice of a moral breakthrough, and then we turned back.

Look at the way we all accustomed ourselves to the term “essential worker,” an ostensible term of respect that instead condemned people to work in manifestly dangerous conditions. The adoption of that term made visible something we now cannot unsee: In the United States the people we rely on most to keep our world functioning are the people we treated as disposable.

we might call the bigger problem structural isolation: abandoned by employers, deprived of shared purpose, denied care. The combined effect sent a strong message that individual lives weren’t worth as much anymore.

People treated one another accordingly. We all remember the viral videos of people screaming at one another in supermarkets and on public transportation. Violent crime spiked. Even reckless driving surged — but it happened only in the United States.

The reasons for that American exceptionalism become only more urgent in an election year, when, as in a public health crisis, presidents can try to bring people together or try to turn them against one another.