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CFD Death Café

What is a Death Café?

Established in August 2013

In hosting CFD Death Cafés in the Hudson Valley, CFD is building a community of care and concern, one supportive of a home for the dying. CFD Death Cafés are held in restaurants, libraries, community centers, and houses of worship throughout Ulster and Dutchess Counties.

Group-led discussions have included information about green burial and other funeral options, religious traditions and spiritual beliefs about dying, do-not-resuscitate and advance care directives—any aspect of one’s final scene in the play of life might be brought to the table. No one gets to proselytize or sell their own point of view. Everyone gets a chance to speak out. Life and death are celebrated—and cake is always served.

In the past–that is, pre-COVID–CFD Death Café in-person events were preceded by a conversation with experts in the following areas of interest, expressed by participants:

  • Advance Directives and the legal aspects of dying
  • Talking about dying with the dying
  • Choices at the end of life
  • Understanding compassion fatigue
  • The shifting climate of funeral and burial options
  • Making every moment count
  • The wisdom arts of dying
  • Securing your LGBTQ identity in death
  • Memoir writing workshop

Join us for an upcoming virtual CFD Death Cafe

Having the greatest concern for the health and safety of our community and friends, we have been holding recent CFD Death Café gatherings on Zoom. Our virtual events do not feature a presentation, but one advantage is that folks from all over the country are logging in to connect with each other and share their ideas and concerns about dying and death. By providing an online safe space for dialoguing, Death Cafe keeps the conversation going. Join our community, and let’s hang out and talk about dying and death!

At Death Cafés, the aim is to increase awareness of death in order to help people make the most of their finite lives. Death Cafés are open to, and respectful of, people of all communities and belief systems. A Death Café is a group-directed conversation of death with no agenda, objectives, or themes. It is a discussion group rather than a grief support or counseling session.

Please note: Prompt attendance is required to be admitted into the meeting. The Zoom meetings open five minutes before the posted start time. A brief introduction and guidelines review gets us all started at five minutes past the posted start time. Then small groups of three to four people will break out into separate rooms for private discussions.

Join us for a virtual CFD Death Cafe, and keep the conversation going! More details on our events page and on Facebook