A Sermon Especially for Am Shalom
Every year, around Rosh HaShanah, the Jewish world holds a version of the same debate – what should we use for tashlich? Traditionalists throw bread crumbs. Environmentalists throw pebbles or fish food or birdseed. I know people who throw flower petals, and people who throw pieces of paper with their sins written out on them, and people who don’t throw anything, but simply stand at the water’s edge and let go of whatever negativity they are holding.
I recently learned that one of my mentors, a very wise woman, uses Bagels for tashlich. If you know me, then you know I love a good bagel, so this initially seemed very wasteful to me. But here’s the reason she gave me. One side of the bagel is for her sins – for the actions and behaviours she is not proud of, and wishes to change. The other side of the bagel, represents her positive actions and choices – the things she is proud of.
The idea of calling to mind our successes, at the same moment of recalling our failures is something we also see in our Yom Kippur liturgy. This evening, we will chant al cheit shechatanu l’fanecha – for the sins we have committed against You, Oh God…. We will chant it over and over again, as the framework for the section of our liturgy called vidui rabbah – the Great Confession – during which we list all of the sins we’ve done, or might have done, or that might have been done by a member of our community. As we list them, we beat our chests. It’s meant to be physically and spiritually painful, and it certainly feels like a central and emotional climax to the day.
In our machzor, Mishkan HaNefesh, the editors sought to balance out the heaviness of this liturgy by also offering us alternate or additional readings that remind us of the good we have done, or could be doing, through acts of healing and repair, and through hakarat ha-tov, recognizing the good in ourselves.
“What gives us strength to pursue goodness?” one of these readings asks us. “Awareness of the good that is around us.”
Our machzor’s editors wanted us to know this: It is important for us to acknowledge where we have gone wrong and it is important for us to celebrate the wins.
When we contemplate what we want to improve upon, we shouldn’t forget to note the improvements we’ve already made. Because when we focus too much on what we’ve done wrong without remembering what we’ve done correctly, or when we harp on the things that won’t change instead of focusing on what we’re grateful for – we become unbalanced; misaligned.
Jewish tradition often tries to point us in the direction of balance. The Jewish mystics believed that the world was created with balance – they described a cosmic Tree of Life structured around God’s 10 Divine attributes. On this Kabbalistic tree – justice is held in balance by compassion, and the knowledge of the mind is balanced out by the knowledge of the heart.
Our sacred texts also come into balance in unexpected ways. I recently listened to an incredible series of shiurim (lessons) on the relationship between the story of Noah and the story of Jonah. I will save you the five hours of detailed intertextual analysis and just cut to the part where we discover that the Prophet Jonah is a symbolic parallel for the dove in the story of Noah and the Ark. Yonah – Jonah’s name in Hebrew, means dove, but most people probably haven’t given that much thought. I know I hadn’t.
In any case – one of many incredible parallels between Yonah the prophet and yonah the dove, is the way in which both of them are sent on a mission. Noah’s dove is sent out to explore whether or not the earth has become habitable, and the prophet Jonah is sent out to warn the people of Ninevah that if they do not stop sinning, God may decide the world is no longer habitable for them. The dove is sent to test the planet – to see if it is ready to be inhabited once more. Jonah is sent to test Nineveh – to see if they are ready to change their ways.
In the first story, the dove seeks the answer to the question: Is God ready for us to try again? And in the second story, the prophet seeks the answer to the question: Is this community ready to try again – to return to the best version of themselves?
In both cases, the answer is yes. The dove brings back an olive branch – a peace offering. God is ready to try again. The survivors disembark (perhaps coining that very word as they did so!) and humanity gets a second chance. In Nineveh, the people are quick to repent. They are ready and willing to try to change. It should be a happy ending, but Jonah is frustrated that the evildoers aren’t going to be punished after all. Yet, through God’s forgiveness of the people of Nineveh, we are reminded that the first step of meaningful change is the desire and commitment to improve.
Just as we balance the accounting of our sins with the recognition of what is good, so too, do we need to find a balance in our approach to change by focusing less on what we have done wrong, and more on what we’d like to be doing right. Another way of thinking about this is that we change TOWARD our best selves, rather than changing AWAY from our worst selves.
It’s interesting to note, that nowhere in the story of Jonah does it go into detail about the sins of Nineveh. God doesn’t harp on the specifics of what they’ve done wrong, and neither do the people themselves. They don’t point fingers, or try to shift the blame from one to another – they simply demonstrate that they care about having acted badly, and wish to do better.
In one of the many emails from Jewish organizations that have been filling up my inbox as the New Year approached, was one which loudly declared:
“STOP. EVERYTHING. NOW. … ask yourself: Who am I?”
“Is this who you want to be in the world?” the author continued… (The) High Holy Days come and say: ‘Hit pause. This is the only life that you are given… If your narrative is choking you, or even just inhibiting you, do something about it.'”
Stop now. Notice where you feel uneasy. Do something about it.
Ask yourself: Who am I now, and who do I want to be?
Jewish educator Beth Lipschutz recently wrote about the process of forgiveness. “On Yom Kippur, we are taught to think about our wrongdoings and apologize to the people we hurt … we fulfill our obligation when we sincerely apologize to a specific person… whether or not that person (apologizes to us, or) offers forgiveness. Most importantly, we believe in the idea of t’shuvah, that our actions need to change to truly make amends.”
This last piece of what Beth has written is particularly important for us to pay attention to: During t’shuvah, “our actions need to change.” Often, when we are in conflict with someone else, it can be very easy to focus on all of the things that we wish they would change. And yet, if we truly want to repair the relationship, the changes we are meant to focus on are the ones within ourselves.
My wise mentor, the one with the tashlich bagels, recently said to me that when we get stuck in thinking, “if only that other person would change”, that’s where we lose our own power. But if we direct our energy instead toward self-management and self-regulation, we strengthen ourselves, and move TOWARD being the kind of person who can respond differently in the future.
This is as true for us as a community as it is for us individually.
It’s no secret that Am Shalom had a bumpy year when it came to relationships. We had some pretty big and very public disagreements. Decisions were challenged. Feelings were hurt. Our small, usually warm community, became chilly and divided. As the rabbi of this community, I heard from people on all sides, and interestingly enough, what I heard the most – from everyone – was what someone else should be doing differently. What someone else needed to change. I didn’t hear a lot of people questioning what they themselves could be doing differently. And I think, perhaps, that is where we all, collectively, went wrong.
Because if we go down to the Bay for tashlich, and start to list all of the things we wish had been done differently as we cast our birdseed into the water, things will get ugly really quickly. But if we take half a bagel each, and do some collective hakarat hatov – if we recall what is wonderful about this community together – we just might be able to begin to heal and move forward with a renewed sense of unity.
So let’s do that. Let’s start a list of things we love about this community. Things that we are proud of, and grateful for.
I’ll start. And I’ll start by telling you why I wanted to be your Rabbi in the first place.
When I decided to leave Cape Town and return to Canada, I knew that I was looking for a community that shared the values that have become most central to my rabbinate – a community where people care about one another and show up for one another; a community that is carried by the contributions of its members; a community that values all kinds of diversity, and a community that shares my love of singing together.
All of these were aspects of Am Shalom that I remembered from my visits to this community back before I moved to Cape Town, and which were spoken about with pride by the folks I spoke to during the interview process. These are also the same aspects that are highlighted on our Am Shalom website. I wonder how many of us have actually taken the time to read our own description of ourselves? Let me share the parts of it that stood out to me when I was considering whether or not this was a community that I wanted to be a part of:
Am Shalom, “stand(s) for a Judaism that, in response to today’s realities, is inclusive, open, and diverse. . . (We) are committed to the principle of inclusion, not exclusion. (As part of the) Reform Movement (we reach) out to Jews-by-choice and interfaith families, (and we are) committed to … absolute equality [regardless of gender-identity] in all areas of Jewish life … (We) are also committed to the full participation of the LGBTQ+ community in synagogue life as well as society at large. . . Our members are active and involved (in) Social Action programs … Shabbat is a joyous occasion at Am Shalom…With our spiritual leader and our wonderful and talented Shirat Am Shalom Choir, we explore Reform Judaism’s traditions, enriching our Jewish experience (together).”
This is who we say we are. And to a large extent, it is accurate.
I love that this is a Shabbat-centered community – where members of all ages and stages and walks of life come together for prayer, for learning and for community. I love that after services, everyone stays and eats and talks. I love that some people stay for hours, just to be together.
I love that this is a community where people look out for each other, offer one another rides, shovel one another’s snow, contribute food, books, toys and clothing for families who are going through a tough time.
I love that we never turn anyone away because of financial need, and that we don’t elevate those who have wealth privilege above those who do not. AND, I love that this is a generous community, where unbudgeted needs are often met quietly and anonymously by those who can afford to help cover the costs.
I love that this community is truly warm and welcoming. Every time someone new walks through our doors, they are welcomed like old friends. Someone always shows them where to find the siddurim, and someone always invites them to sit at their table. I love that when we pause the service to greet one another, I have to shout to get everyone back to their seats because we take welcoming one another so seriously.
I love that we have dedicated volunteers, like our Social Justice committee,who stepped up when I noticed there was an absence of involvement, and who enthusiastically joined me in moving our Tikkun Olam beyond the synagogue walls to respond to local issues, and who march together with PRIDE as Jews, as allies, and as friends.
I love that some of our volunteers have been giving of their time, energy, skills and resources for decades, and I love that some of our volunteers come with new energy and new perspectives.
I love that we embrace our non-Jewish friends and partners, and I love that this community values interfaith families as much as families where both partners are Jewish – so much so that you expressly chose a rabbi who would stand under the chuppah with mixed-heritage couples proudly and lovingly, even though that is still something that is not commonly done.
I love that I get to sing with all of you, and I love singing with our Shirat Am Shalom choir. I wish we could sing together even more often than we do.
I love that we celebrate our children and their joyful noise. That we don’t shush them; that we hold one another’s babies.
I love that we don’t care who sits in the pews and who sits at the tables and who sits on the couch at the back – I love that everyone can sit where they are comfortable.
And I even love that we challenge one another – because it shows how much we all care about this place, even when we disagree about how it should be organized or managed.
Is our own description of ourselves completely accurate? No. Is there room for improvement? Yes. But what our description of ourselves tells me, is that even when we are not living up to our highest potential, we know what we want that version to be. It speaks powerfully to who this congregation has been and who this congregation aspires to be. It tells me that we know what our values are, and that we have had many times and many examples where we have lived successfully by them. If there are places where we’ve gone off track, then we can easily return to these words to remind us of what we need to change TOWARD. Not by waiting for that other person to change what we think they should be doing differently. Not by waiting for someone else to fix something we are unhappy about. But by each and every one of us returning to these questions individually:
Who do I want to be?
Who do I want us to be, together?
What changes can I make to help move us TOWARD unity and strength?
If nothing else, I would like you to ask yourselves this: What would this congregation look like if we were at our highest and best?
I think it would look a lot like it already does, but maybe with a little more compassion, a little more grace, a little more kindness, and a little bit more of everyone pulling together, instead of pulling apart.
I know that it is discouraging when we don’t feel that everyone is heard. So this year, let’s try to empower each unique, diverse, and sacred voice within our congregation.
I know how hard it is to volunteer when you’re not sure if you are contributing to something you still believe in. So this year, let’s believe in our collective ability to work together TOWARD our highest and best selves – so that each of us can feel positively and proud about the different ways we are able to contribute to this special and sacred place.
In one of the many emails that flooded my inbox this week, I read the following questions: What will we carry with us into the New Year? What ideas will guide us? What values will sustain us? What commitments will strengthen Jewish life for the years ahead?
As individuals and as a community, we need to be guided by nothing more than these questions:
Who do we want to be? And how will we get there?
We are Am Shalom – the People of Peace. We already know who we are. We already know what it looks like when we are at our best. Let’s move back toward our highest and best selves – each of us for our own sake, and each of us for the sake of this Sacred Assembly.
In the Mishnah we read: Makom sh’libi ohev – sham raglai molikhot oti.
The place that my heart holds dear, there my feet will bring me near.
Kein Yehi Ratzon. May it be God’s Will.