A Grief Observed

On Being a Living Priest in a Dying Church in Sweden

by Folke T. Olofsson

Even if the title “A Grief Observed” had not already been employed, I would use it, for what I write about is a grief: the dying, and eventually perhaps the death, of a loved one: the Church of Sweden, in which I was ordained a priest 35 years ago. It is a grief observed, as if I were standing apart from what happened, no longer involved in the painful process, but looking at it from the outside, as if it were happening to someone else—or is that just something . . .

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Folke T. Olofsson is docent of theological and ideological studies at Uppsala University, and is rector of Rasbo parish in the (Lutheran) Church of Sweden. He is a contributing editor of Touchstone.

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