Who is Lisasia, and what is The Revolving Altar?
The Revolving Altar is a community and arts-based platform, focused on collaborating with artists, whose aim is to create events where folks can interact with themes of death and grief autonomously, through various mediums, in order to garner essential skills that we can apply when grief comes as an unannounced visitor—
Founded by me, Lisasia.
My work as a student of grief began when I was young. I learned that it is not grief itself that creates cavernous scarring. It’s unsupported loss lacking in the resources one needs to metabolize it that leaves people feeling lost and constantly seeking. So, I’ve dedicated my life to finding the balms, sutures, poetry, and proverbs necessary for coming out on the other side more human, rather than less.
I acquired my Funeral Celebrant certification from the Celebrant Institute in 2021, as well as a trauma informed Sexual Violence Counselor certification through the Sexual Violence Center of Saint Paul in 2017. The work of creating ceremony that honors loved ones lost, as well as holding space for those surviving loss in its myriad of forms, has continued to be endlessly rewarding and rich in wisdom.
What’s a good death, and why should we be thinking about it?
How can approaching death with grounded intentionality and curiosity lead us to more life and love?
What would be the result of exploring each and every way there is to say goodbye?
How would engaging with the process of death as fully as possible lend to a deeper reverence for all that lives?
For many years we’ve maintained a society that would prefer to sustain a barely occupied body until its last cell is no longer viable— behind closed doors, within sanitary walls. The concept of mortality is suppressed at great cost. The dying are relegated to facilities with rubber gloved staff and sterile protocol. We absorb much violent death through media while at the same time avoiding its spiritual and emotional implications. We call on clergymen to recite passages at funerals that we don’t always connect with, because that is the way of things.
Death is a rite of passage, a doorway through which all life will pass. It is a profound transition that mirrors the cycles of nature and the inevitability of change. It is not a failure or an interruption, it is the transformation of a relative. It’s an invitation for the living to transform too— as community gathers, and we read poems or proverbs, as we rediscover what has been most meaningful and promise to keep it true.
Imagine a world where our elders have agency over the things that matter most to them during their final days. Imagine a world where we celebrate them with our whole hearts, injecting sincerity, love, and meaning back into our ceremonies. In this world, dying is not hidden in sterile rooms, but embraced as a sacred rite of passage—a deeply personal yet shared experience.
This is a world in which we can teach our children that death is not a shadow to fear but a reminder to live fully, to love deeply, and to treasure the fleeting beauty of life. If we remember that death is a continuation of the cycles we see in nature—a fallow season that gives way to new growth, then we connect to something larger than ourselves. We find purpose.
