Closing Gathering for the 18th Annual Bloomington Community Altar Celebrating The Dead

The altar celebrates the ancestors, both distant and near, recent and ancient. We invite visitors to contribute to the altar in honor of their deceased loved ones. There are pens and paper available to write notes to the departed and place them on or attach them to the altar. Visitors are also invited to leave a gift to their ancestors on the altar.
Offerings and notes left on the altar are collected each year and incorporated into future altars. Each year the Community Altar is built upon the foundation of the previous years’ offerings. Many of the items on the altar have been there for years.
We encourage visitors to spend some time with the book on the altar that contains all of the notes left during previous altars. We collect these each year and read them after the altar is taken down and then put them in this book so visitors can read them. Some are so poignant they literally bring tears.