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About Us Madison Area Chapter information - Chartered 1982 Meeting Location: Monona Evangelical Lutheran Church (across the street from Monona High School) 4411 Monona Ave. Monona, WI Meeting Time: 7:00 - 8:30 P.M. 3rd Thursday of each month Whether you come to a meeting for the first time, are currently involved with our chapter, or returning to our group after many years, we extend our hand of fellowship to you and your family. More than likely you come to a meeting because your family has been touched by grief and the loss of a child. Perhaps you come with a friend, family, or neighbor and we hope the program will be an inspiration to each one. We have served the Madison area since 1982. Only with the help of many committed volunteers does an organization keep active and willing to serve a bereaved community for that length of time. We all remember the overwhelming grief. We all remember the 1st meeting. We all remember the first time we laughed. We all remember the 1st candle we lit after the death of our precious child. We never forget our friends who walked with us during the worst time in our life. They are compassionate, they understand, and they have been there. What a feeling to know we are not alone in our loss and our grief. The Compassionate Friends organization teaches us that love never dies. We know that love grows and grows within our hearts and those precious memories remain with us forever. We teach others the stepping stones of grief, taking hold of their hand, and giving them a hug. We hope you will truly feel a part of this family and this love as we look to the future with renewed spirit for sharing the hope that The Compassionate Friends provide. Vision
The vision statement of The Compassionate Friends is that everyone who needs us will find us and everyone who finds us will be helped.
Mission
When a child dies, at any age, the family suffers intense pain and may feel hopeless and isolated. The Compassionate Friends provides highly personal comfort, hope, and support to every family experiencing the death of a son or a daughter, a brother or a sister, or a grandchild, and helps others better assist the grieving family (adopted 2-25-2012).
Credo
We need not walk alone. We are The Compassionate Friends. We reach out to each other with love, with understanding, and with hope. The children we mourn have died at all ages and from many different causes, but our love for them unites us. Your pain becomes my pain, just as your hope becomes my hope. We come together from all walks of life, from many different circumstances. We are a unique family because we represent many races, creeds, and relationships. We are young, and we are old. Some of us are far along in our grief, but others still feel a grief so fresh and so intensely painful that they feel helpless and see no hope. Some of us have found our faith to be a source of strength, while some of us are struggling to find answers. Some of us are angry, filled with guilt or in deep depression, while others radiate an inner peace. But whatever pain we bring to this gathering of The Compassionate Friends, it is pain we will share, just as we share with each other our love for the children who have died. We are all seeking and struggling to build a future for ourselves, but we are committed to building a future together. We reach out to each other in love to share the pain as well as the joy, share the anger as well as the peace, share the faith as well as the doubts, and help each other to grieve as well as to grow. We Need Not Walk Alone. We Are The Compassionate Friends.
©2007 The Compassionate Friends
Siblings Walking Together (formerly Sibling Credo)
We are the surviving siblings of The Compassionate Friends.
We are brought together by the deaths of our brothers and sisters.
Open your hearts to us, but have patience with us.
Sometimes we will need the support of our friends.
At other times we need our families to be there.
Sometimes we must walk alone, taking our memories with us,
continuing to become the individuals we want to be.
We cannot be our dead brother or sister;
however, a special part of them lives on with us.
When our brothers and sisters died, our lives changed.
We are living a life very different from what we envisioned,
and we feel the responsibility to be strong even when we feel weak.
Yet we can go on because we understand better than many others
the value of family and the precious gift of life.
Our goal is not to be the forgotten mourners that we sometimes are,
but to walk together to face our tomorrows as surviving siblings of The Compassionate Friends.
©The Compassionate Friends
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