Day of Healing Justice
On December 21, 2023, Casa Finca and North Star Fund co-hosted a Day of Healing Justice in honor of the Winter Solstice.
This beautiful offering was dedicated to the care for and relationship to self of community organizers and movement leaders in the Hudson Valley region. It was held at True North, a home for personal and planetary transformation in Hudson, New York.
The event was organized by Suanny Upegui, founder of Casa Finca and a member of North Star Fund’s Hudson Valley Community Funding Committee, and Gabriela Quintanilla, Hudson Valley Program Officer at North Star Fund.
North Star Fund grantee organizations that joined the event include All of Us, Hudson Catskill Housing Coalition, Kite’s Nest, Adelante Student Voices, Rock Steady Farm and Sweet Freedom Farm.
The Day of Healing Justice was a free gathering where organizers could take time to reflect and reset their nervous systems, whether by sitting in silence or connecting with others (or both!). Early in the day, everyone was invited to engage in writing, taking sauna sessions, listening to music, journaling, going for a walk and drinking homemade tea from the tea station.
Later in the afternoon there was an introductory activity and icebreaker to bring everyone together. This was followed by a cacao ceremony and a sound bath session to ground ourselves in the fact that resting is a radical act—we deserve to take a breath to reflect on the strategies we are using to organize on the ground and to sustain ourselves.
The cacao ceremony was guided by Suanny Upegui. During the ceremony, participants planted seeds in preparation for the solstice and the year ahead. Each person told a story of what the seed represented for them, and then people exchanged seeds before planting them—so they planted each others’ stories with love, to grow and shine.
The sound bath offered a collective, dedicated time for resting. Meditative music was guided by Samer Ghadry, a musician and acoustic rejuvenation practitioner who explores multiple approaches in sound healing and leads sound baths. We closed the day with a beautiful communal dinner prepared by local chef Laurel Barkan.
Why Healing Justice?
This Day of Healing Justice was offered at a time when many of our grantees and community members are involved in intense organizing for Palestine—and thus a time of collective mourning and grieving.
Movement leaders expressed how overwhelming and exhausting it can be to continue to organize and do “outer work” without the space, time, capacity and freedom to look inward—especially as our communities continue to navigate multiple crises and threats. We hold so much within ourselves, our bodies and our spirits, across generations. By setting aside time to take care of ourselves—to heal in community and to heal, build and grow our communities—we can have a deeper and more sustainable impact.
At North Star Fund, we believe that healing justice is both valuable and essential. We want to support organizers to engage in healing justice work in connection to other liberatory and movement-building practices. We’re exploring how best to provide healing justice grants to our current grantees—we hope to share more information and opportunities later this year!
Learn more about healing justice here and here.
Photos by Walter Hergt.