Gold: Keeping Them Alive
"Celebrating their life keeps them alive," says Persephone Modeste, a therapist based in Rochester, N.Y., where friends and family pay tribute to loved ones killed by gun violence using customs and rituals that signify death is not the end of life for the deceased. Loved ones are celebrated and kept close through objects and events that honor their legacy. "Sometimes, the pain bears you down so much that you have to think of something joyful to be able to move on because it can be debilitating," says Modeste.
Josh Comforts Titiana
Josh Lowe comforts Titiana Bogar, the mother of Ly’Saun Curry, at the Monroe County Supreme Court in Rochester, N.Y., on Oct. 28, 2022, after receiving the news of the guilty verdict of Johnathan Spinks, the man who shot and killed Curry on Oct. 2, 2022. Curry was 20 years old. Clothing with images of the deceased is a popular ritual to honor someone. The origins trace back to Oakland, Calif., in the 1990s, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.
