The Longest Night

press release: Join us in remembering and honoring people who died without shelter in Dane County and elsewhere. Too often, their deaths are invisible.

We will be gathering on Wednesday, Dec. 21, the longest night of the year, with houseless individuals, members of local faith communities and representatives from social service agencies.

3:00pm, Capitol Square at the intersection of E. Main, S. Pinckney & King Streets

A brief outdoor ceremony with music, prayer, reflections, remembrances of neighbors, horse-drawn hearse procession around Capitol

Donations of warm socks, long underwear, hats and gloves can be dropped off at First Congregational United Church of Christ, 1609 University Ave., Madison. Please enter through the rear door off of the parking lots. The church doors are open during the day as the daycare in the building is open. Individuals must wear a mask.

Each year we like to create memorial cards for each of the individuals remembered at the event, and for those who may have passed and been remembered in previous years. Eventually we would like to create a Remembrance Wall that would include these cards and could travel to various locations to serve as a traveling memorial to those we mourn. While the service is primarily intended to remember our neighbors, who were homeless when they died, it is also a place where people who are formerly or currently homeless can remember others that they lost but were unable to attend a funeral or memorial service.

With that in mind, we are asking that, if you have someone you would like remembered at the service, that you provide us a little information about the person, their gifts, interests, qualities you admired, anything you would like to share.