The power of speaking names aloud, both as spiritual practice and as refusal to let the dead be erased or forgotten by systems that would silence them.
In bhakti tradition, repeating the divine name (hari-nama) is itself a spiritual practice—the name carries presence, calls forth the sacred, and enacts connection. For Mirabai, singing Krishna's name was not mere repetition but invocation. In collective grief, naming the dead serves similar functions: it asserts their reality in the face of erasure, honors their particularity, keeps them alive in memory, and refuses the systems that would bury or minimize their stories. When we say their names aloud—in gatherings, in art, in daily conversation—we participate in a spiritual resistance. This is especially vital for those whose deaths result from injustice: the murdered, the disappeared, the casualties of war and negligence. Speaking their names becomes an act of reparative love. It says: You mattered. Your life was real. Your death will not be forgotten. Your name will not disappear. This practice recognizes that in systems of oppression, forgetting is a form of violence. Hari-nama teaches that the living can keep the dead present through the simple, powerful act of speaking their names with reverence and presence.
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