What is Community Healing?
Community healing refers to a collective process where a community comes together to address trauma, mental health, and substance abuse issues in a holistic way. Unlike individual therapeutic models that focus solely on personal recovery, community healing recognizes that wounds—whether caused by violence, systemic oppression, historical injustice, or disaster—are often shared across groups and require collective responses. Most take a holistic view of healing, recognizing and oftentimes emphasizing the mind-body-spiritual connection, and also believing that community and the environment are key elements in individual healing.
Community healing operates at multiple scales: it may address harm between members through restorative practices, respond to acute crises like natural disasters, or work to repair intergenerational wounds passed down through colonization, slavery, war, or forced displacement. Community healing, or healing justice, is an approach used to respond to unfair treatment that certain communities have experienced over many generations. It focuses on building community-led responses to this trauma and was created to sustain emotional, physical, spiritual, and environmental well-being.
Origins & Lineage
Community-based healing practices are not new innovations but ancient traditions. Community healing is deeply embedded in the traditions of many Indigenous and marginalised cultures. Practices such as talking circles among First Nations communities, Ubuntu in African philosophy, and communal mourning rituals in various societies exemplify the inherent value placed on shared experiences and collective care. One of the earliest social systems, recognized in predynastic ancient Egypt (Kemet), placed value on truth, order and balance, harmony, morality, and justice in community living and was embodied in the practices of the Goddess Ma’at. “Do Ma’at and Live” was a way of life.
In North America, healing circles are deeply rooted in the traditional practices of indigenous people and have been used for generations among First Nations people of Canada and Native American tribes. Healing circles have been a fundamental part of Indigenous traditional healing practices for many years worldwide. A healing circle is a method of promoting healing that is based on Indigenous traditional belief systems. Ceremonies involve the patient, the family, and the community in the healing process. Ceremonial gatherings may last for days or weeks; the more people that are present, the greater the healing energy. Through their participation in songs, prayer, music, and dance, the family and community contribute healing energy to the patient.
During the 1990s, members of First Nations in Canada began teaching the Circle practice to non-Native people. They chose to do this because First Nation communities were seeking alternatives to the mass incarceration of their people, which was—and remains—another form of genocide. Judge Barry Stuart, a judge in the Canadian Yukon Territory, was preparing to sentence a repeat offender. Frustrated by the failure of the conventional judicial process to rehabilitate this offender, he decided to rely on a local First Nations process, where a talking circle was convened involving the offender, his family, and community members.
The contemporary term “healing justice” emerged more recently. The term “community healing” or “healing justice” was coined by Cara Page and the Kindred Healing Justice Collective. The movement was created by queer and trans people of color, Black and brown femmes, and their allies.
Truth and Reconciliation Commissions represent another lineage of community healing. In 1995, The Truth and Reconciliation Commission of South Africa was identified as the first commission to hold public hearings in which both victims and perpetrators were heard. TRHT is modeled on Truth and Reconciliation Commissions (TRCs) around the world, like those held in South Africa at the end of apartheid.
How It’s Practiced
Community healing takes diverse forms depending on cultural context and the nature of harm being addressed.
Healing Circles: Members sit in a circle to consider a problem or a question. The circle starts with a prayer, usually by the person convening the circle, or by an elder, when an elder is involved. A talking stick is held by the person who speaks (other sacred objects may also be used, including eagle feathers and fans). Circle practices include a variety of activities, such as sharing personal experiences, breathing exercises, chanting, and group prayer.
Indigenous Ceremonies: Traditional practices vary by nation but often include sweat lodge ceremonies, smudging with sacred plants, storytelling, and land-based healing. In this protected environment the community or individual go to pray for healing. Participating in a sweat lodge ceremony is a way of cleansing the body, mind, and soul and being in harmony with the universe.
Restorative Justice Practices: Community healing can address harm done between members of a community through restorative justice practices. This includes accountability and reparations, as well as a community-based process to heal harm done to victims, the larger community, and the offenders themselves, by addressing mental health and emotional health needs.
Crisis Response: After a natural disaster or mass shooting, community-based healing at a large group level addresses the emotional and physical needs that the community has in the wake of the crisis. It can include resources to help a community collectively grieve, such as through vigils and memorials; making mental health resources widely available; and creating opportunities for the community to come together to rebuild.
Healing Justice Practices: Practices like collective art, rituals, altar-building, and energy healing are part of healing justice. These approaches center community-led responses and explicitly address systemic oppression.
Community Healing Today
Contemporary seekers encounter community healing through multiple channels. Restorative justice circles are now used in schools, criminal justice settings, and conflict resolution programs across North America. In educational settings, Healing Circles have proven invaluable in fostering conflict resolution and nurturing trust among students and faculty. By providing a safe and supportive space for open dialogue and understanding, these circles contribute to a harmonious and inclusive learning environment.
Health care settings increasingly integrate community healing approaches. Indigenous health programs in Canada, Australia, and New Zealand incorporate traditional healing practices alongside Western medicine. Community-based mental health initiatives, particularly those serving communities of color and immigrant populations, may offer healing circles, group rituals, and culturally-grounded practices.
Truth, Racial Healing & Transformation™ (TRHT) is a movement for community members – individuals, neighbors, organizations and public decision-makers to collaborate on creating a more equitable community for everyone. TRHT is community-led, cross-racial, cross-sector and intergenerational. Organizations like BEAM Collective, Kindred Healing Justice Collective, and local Truth and Reconciliation initiatives offer workshops, convenings, and training.
Some practitioners now offer trauma-informed group therapy that incorporates collective healing principles, particularly for addressing shared experiences like racism, migration, gender-based violence, or pandemic-related loss.
Common Misconceptions
Community healing is not a replacement for individual therapy or medical treatment. While it addresses collective dimensions of trauma, individuals with acute mental health crises, severe PTSD, or other clinical conditions often require professional clinical care.
It is not universally welcomed or culturally appropriate. Colonial histories often disrupted these traditions, imposing Western psychological paradigms that emphasised the individual while marginalising communal practices. Decolonising mental health requires reviving and integrating these community-oriented approaches into contemporary healing frameworks. When non-Indigenous facilitators lead healing circles without proper training, permission, or cultural understanding, this can constitute appropriation.
Community healing does not mean everyone must share their trauma publicly. Consent, safety, and voluntary participation are foundational. Some healing circles focus on building connection and resilience without requiring disclosure of personal wounds.
It is not a quick fix. Collective healing addresses collectively-shared wounds held across a large group of people. As a field of research and practice, it is vast and varied. It is new and nascent in some ways, but also ancient and steeped in a rich history in other ways. Healing intergenerational trauma or repairing systemic harm requires sustained commitment over months or years.
How to Begin
For those seeking to participate in community healing, begin by identifying what type of healing you’re called toward. Are you addressing personal trauma within a community context, working on restorative justice after conflict, or engaging with historical and systemic wounds?
Look for existing circles or programs in your area. Many Indigenous cultural centers, community health organizations, restorative justice programs, and faith communities offer healing circles. Organizations like the Center for Justice Innovation, local Truth and Reconciliation initiatives, and regional healing justice collectives may have public offerings.
If you wish to convene or facilitate healing work, proper training is essential. The International Institute for Restorative Practices offers courses in circle processes. Indigenous-led organizations sometimes offer training in traditional practices to those who have been given permission to carry this work.
For understanding the frameworks, resources include “Healing Collective Trauma” by Thomas Hübl, scholarly work on restorative justice by Howard Zehr, and writings by Cara Page and the Kindred Healing Justice Collective on healing justice as a framework for social movements.
Consider starting with community-building circles before moving to healing-specific work. These establish trust, teach the structure, and create the relational foundation necessary for deeper healing processes.