Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s wife, Jenny joined hundreds of guest at Woronora Memorial Park’s Pregnancy and Infant Loss Remembrance Day ceremony on October 15.
The event was one of hundreds of similar remembrance ceremonies and candlelight memorials held throughout the world on the day.
The ceremony culminates in the lighting of candles to create a “wave of light” memorial around the world.
Due to geographic location and the rotation of the earth, Australia was among the first countries in the world to light candles that then followed the world’s sunsets.
As it was a sitting day in Parliament, the Prime Minister of Australia was unable to attend.
Scott Morrison’s wife, Jenny Morrison drove from Kirribilli to represent Mr Morrison as well as their family for the special service.
At the symbolic time of 7 pm with hundreds of lit candles forming a spiritual living memorial of light, Graham Boyd chief executive of the Southern Metropolitan Cemeteries in NSW, led a minute silence followed with reflective words “This is a special time on a special day and in our special place when, as a community, we remember the babies born sleeping, those that were carried but never held, those that were held but could not be taken home, those who went home but could not stay. We remember.”
Woronora Memorial Park has created three special letterboxes for letters addressed to people who have passed on.
The letterboxes are located within children areas. The Wave of Light memorial service welcomed family and friends to write messages, letters, cards and draw pictures for those no longer with a “message of love”.
All messages collected during the evening were posted in the “Angel Gabriel” letterbox located at the entrance to the largest children’s area within the Park.
Since the first letterboxes were installed in 2016, thousands of letters, cards and drawings have been posted.
The messages are cremated on a regular basis after which the ash from those messages is scattered in special areas of the Park.
