Turning Memories into Action - Celebrating the 40th Anniversary of Bolton Street Synagogue - Rosh Hashanah Morning Sermon - 5787

 

 

Shana Tova!  Today, on Rosh Hashanah we wish each other a Happy New Year.  You might not know but this holiday has many names.  Among them is Yom HaZikaron – the Day of Remembrance.  Today, the shofar awakens us to remember our past actions.  As Rabbi Karyn Kedar teaches, “The Day of Remembrance asks us to turn around to look into the past for its lessons, its mistakes, its greatness.”[i] 

That’s why I think it’s appropriate this morning for us to remember who we’ve been as a congregation and all that we’ve accomplished.  Today is our 40^th High Holy Days!  40 times Bolton Street Synagogue has gathered to welcome the New Year.  This morning, we’ll reminisce on 40 years of memories.

It was 1986,[ii] when Baltimore’s newest synagogue gathered in a meeting room at Brown Memorial Church.  I was told that room was small, and so, those first High Holy Days were held at the stately building on Eutaw Place, the former Oheb Shalom Congregation.  A few years later, a small group gathered in our first building in Bolton Hill.  There was no custodian, so members fixed up the building and bonded over the cleaning of toilets.  Children set up the chairs, leaving just one foot length and one foot width between each row making sure to pack everyone in.  Those first years were special because that building was ours.

But I was told it wasn’t always so pleasant!  When Rosh Hashanah was early, it would be unbearably hot in a building without A/C.  In 2004, the first High Holy Days were held here on Cold Spring Lane. We might have lost the breezes, but our new building was accessible to all, and we never worried about the weather!

Over these last 40 High Holy Days, countless lay leaders and rabbis, educators and cantors have led the congregation in song and celebration.  Children danced “at high tide, low tide,” Tots sang the Shofar Song, congregants chanted Torah, musicians shared their talents, while a multitude of adults and kids blew shofar.   At our High Holy Day Food Drive, kids would weigh the donations and excitingly announce when we beat last year’s numbers.   In Roland Park, a new tradition was born where picnic dinners would be set up across the Meadow as we welcomed each New Year.  On Yom Kippur, we offered a blessing for all our non-Jewish family members.  We weathered a pandemic participating in services through our computer screens.  Over the years, we noshed, we learned, and we prayed.  Today, we remember 40 years as a congregation! 

Memory is at the heart of what it means to be a Jew.  The word Zakhor, to remember, appears 197 times in the Bible.  Each year at the Passover Seder, all of us, even the wisest amongst us, must retell the story of the Exodus.  Our Torah reminds us that we cannot move forward unless we remember where we’ve come from. As Rabbi Jonathan Sacks teaches: “History is his story – memory is my story.  History is information.  Memory, by contrast, is part of my identity… Memory is the past as present, as it lives in me.”[iii] 

That’s why we as a congregation, on our 40^th Anniversary, decided to share our Bolton Street Synagogue memories. On a Friday evening earlier this April, we kicked off our House Meeting Campaign. Over 100 congregants assembled in the Social Hall as each person shared their “Bolton Street Story.”  From April until August, we gathered an additional fifteen times, where groups of 6 – 12 congregants met for a House Meeting to share their stories as well as their hopes and dreams for the future. 

We want to celebrate this incredible endeavor.  Dozens of congregants led this House Meeting Campaign.  Thank you for your hard work.  Please stand if you organized, hosted, led, or were part of our House Meeting Campaign!  In addition, over 130 member units, half of our congregation, joined us for at least one conversation.  How amazing that so many of you took time out of your schedule to join us!

By far the most repeated theme that came up during these conversations was around belonging.  At every meeting, congregants shared stories about how welcoming our community is to non-Jewish family members, Jews-by-choice, LGBTQ people, Jews of color, and those who don’t feel welcome in other synagogue.  Bolton Street Synagogue was described as a place where you could come as you are, where you felt you belonged, and where there was no-judgment.  We aren’t perfect as a congregation, but that is something we should celebrate!

These stories illustrate who we are.  They communicate our identity and our vision.  They remind us of the values that we hold most dear, as shared in our mission statement, “To be an inclusive Jewish home for the diverse Baltimore community engaging in spirituality, friendship, learning, and social justice.”[iv]

We know memory serves as a building block for Jewish identity, but according to our rabbis that’s not enough.  Our memories should also spur us to action. In a few minutes, we will hear the blast of the shofar.  The second section of the shofar service, Zichronot,[v] Remembrances, includes a long list of verses in which God remembers.  In every single example, God first remembers and then acts.  After God remembers Noah on the Ark, the flood waters disperse.  After God remembers our ancestors groaning under bondage, the Israelites are freed.  After God remembers Rachel navigating infertility, her womb is open. 

That responsibility for turning memories into action applies to us too!  Dr Ellen Umansky teaches: “The obligation to remember cannot be separated from the obligation to observe.”[vi]  We remember our loved ones by lighting a yahrtzeit candle.  We remember the creation of the world by resting on Shabbat.  In the Torah, each time we are commanded to “not oppress the stranger” it follows with “for you were strangers in Egypt.”[vii]  It is the memory of our slavery that propels us to act.  Memories are never enough unless they lead us to action.

On this, our 40^th Rosh Hashanah, we too should remember all the good work we accomplished as a synagogue![viii]  We served meals at homeless shelters on Christmas Day.  We marched for women’s rights, marriage equality, and our immigrant neighbors.  We welcomed homeless families into our building providing them with a place to sleep, meals to eat, and entertainment for their children.  We were advocates for better public education for our kids.  We wrote postcards encouraging people to vote.  We wrapped Christmas presents for families in need. We baked casseroles.  We did mitzvot on Good Deeds Day.  We dropped off food for immigrant families. The building might have changed, the people might have changed, even our actions might have changed, but the foundational values have remained the same.

Memory helps form our Jewish identity.  Memory spurs us to action.  But memory must also serve as a bridge to connect us to the future. Becca Leviss the founder and director of the Judeofuturism Project reminds us that at its best Jewish storytelling is both past and future oriented. In Deuteronomy, we retell our story while preparing to move into a future promised land.  At each Passover seder, we collapse time and imagine that we are in the story.  We were slaves, but at the same time fully liberated.  Our memories highlight our past while allowing us to dream of our future.[ix]

The House Meetings this spring and summer were not just an opportunity to reminisce or to be nostalgic.  That would not be enough.  Like the Passover Seder, these gatherings spurred us to hope and dream of our future.  There were three overarching themes that came up during our conversations:

First, Maintaining Intimacy – We heard how excited you are to welcome new members to our community!  As we continue to grow, you’re thinking about the best ways to maintain that intimate “everybody knows you” feeling for our newest and long-term members alike.

Second, Building Community – we heard how you are looking for more informal small get togethers as well as intergenerational gatherings.  You are also thinking about our long-time members as well as seniors and how we can support them, especially as they grow older.

Third, Opportunities to Engage – we heard of your willingness and interest to be more engaged in synagogue life.  You want to get more involved, but you don’t always know how.  You wish to further our acts of Tikkun Olam and create new opportunities for learning and adult engagement.

These three big themes: maintaining intimacy, building community, and opportunities to engage, will drive us as a congregation in the year ahead.  This is only the first step!  Please join us for a further conversation in October when we share more of our findings and work together to achieve these dreams.

Why wait until we gather in October?  Let’s start right now with something a little bit different!  We’re going to have a short, four-minute conversation!    Hopefully with someone you don’t know.  At the end of each row are postcards that can now be passed out.  They list the themes that I shared as well as these questions: “Which theme is most important to you?  Why is it important to you?”  Turn towards those around you, in groups of 3 to 4, introduce yourselves, read the postcard, and answer the questions!  When we start singing, please stop your conversation and rejoin us.

[After four minutes of conversation, we join together with the singing of Hashiveinu]

The prayer we just sang, Hashiveinu,[x] ask the Holy One to “renew our days as in the past.”  On this, our 40^th High Holy Days, may we find a sense of renewal as we did in the past.  May our memories strengthen our identity.  May our memories spur us to action.  May our memories build community.  May our memories link our past to our future.  Amen.

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[i] “Fragments of Memory” by Rabbi Karyn D. Kedar found in Rosh Hashanah Readings edited by Rabbi Dov Peretz Elkins, p. 202

[ii] Thank you to many of our Bolton Street Synagogue founding members as well as those who joined in recent years for sharing their favorite Bolton Street Synagogue High Holy Day memories.

[iii] Rabbi Jonathan Sacks Haggadah, p. 38

[iv] https://www.boltonstreet.org/welcome/mission-vision-values/

[v] This second section of the Shofar Service, Zichronot, Remembrance, can be found in Mishkan HaNefesh Rosh Hashanah on pp. 262-269

[vi] “Zakhor” by Rabbi Ellen Umansky found in Rosh Hashanah Readings edited by Rabbi Dov Peretz Elkins, p. 198

[vii] Multiple examples found in the Torah including Exodus 22:20, 23:9, and Leviticus 19:34

[viii] Thank you to our many long-time members and Social Action Committee members who shared their memories of the Tikkun Olam work that we’ve accomplished over 40 years.

[ix] Rebecca Leviss, “Who We Are and Who We Can Become: Jewish Storytelling and Democratic Imagination,” in Sources: A Journal of Jewish Ideas, Summer 2026, p. 118-120

[x] Lamentations 5:21

We are One Human Family - Lessons from 9/11 - Erev Rosh Hashanah Sermon 5787

 

Like every other weekday morning, Usman Farman[i] stepped off the train and headed to work.  It was 9am on a beautiful sunny September morning, not a cloud in the sky. Usman, a twenty-two-year-old recent college graduate, walked to his office and took the elevator up to the 27^th floor.  When he arrived that morning, he looked out his office window and saw to his horror, a flaming hole in the North Tower. 

With strong urging from his boss, Usman Farman, Pakistani by birth, Muslim by faith, bounded down the stairs of 7 World Trade Center to reach the street.  Just as the South Tower was collapsing, Usman tripped over his own feet and fell onto his back.  As the billowing cloud of glass was about to overtake him, Usman wondered if this would be his end.

Twenty-five years ago, September 11, 2001, our world changed forever.  Those of us who lived through that fateful day remember exactly where we were when we heard the news.  We gathered in shock around tv sets as the towers collapsed.  We worried about those at the Pentagon.  We heard of heroes who took down a plane in Pennsylvania.  We numbly watched first responders save countless lives.

Those early days were filled with so much fear.  Some hunkered down with family or co-workers, but many of us were isolated, all alone.  9/11 brought darkness, mistrust, and uncertainty.

Those feelings seem so incompatible with the start of this New Year.  Rosh Hashanah is our antidote to disunity, isolation, and fear.  Today is our homecoming when we gather as one Jewish community.  Indeed, Rosh Hashanah is truly our holiday of hope.  As 9/11 and Rosh Hashanah intertwine this year, we gather in mixed emotions: sadness and optimism, mourning and hope.  This Rosh Hashanah we dream of a better world as we remember our past.     

Remembrance is a funny thing.  We each remember the past through our lived experience or the unique memories we hold.  But, what about those who weren’t alive on that fateful day?  25 years is a long time.  An entire generation has passed.  A kindergartner in 2001 is now an adult while a forty-year-old is nearing retirement.

I’ve been thinking quite a bit about memory.  What memories do we wish to pass down to our children?  Which values and lessons do we wish to impart to the younger generation?  How do we remember that fateful day?  This evening, I’ll share three short stories.  These stories are filled with emotion that touch upon the very themes of Rosh Hashanah.  As we blow the shofar, we recognize our responsibility towards one another.  That we are all one human family.   

Rick Rescorla[ii] was the head of corporate security for Morgan Stanley.  After the 1993 terrorist attack, Rick was worried about the security risks at the World Trade Center.  He demanded that Morgan Stanley move their offices to New Jersey, but when that wasn’t feasible, he decided to take matters into his own hands.  For years, his co-workers grumbled when Rick made them practice emergency drills.

When American Airlines Flight 11 slammed into the North Tower, the Port Authority ordered everyone in the South Tower to remain at their desks.  With some colorful language, that I can’t share tonight, Rick told them: “not a chance.”  From his office on the 71^st floor, Rick grabbed his bullhorn, walkie-talkie, and cell phone, and got to work.  He began the evacuation of all Morgan Stanley employees from the 20 floors they occupied.

On September 11^th, they were prepared.  Employees calmly descended, two abreast, down the stairwells, just as they had practiced.  In just 16 minutes, more than 2,500 employees and visitors at Morgan Stanley were safely out of the building before the second plane even hit their South Tower.

Once his co-workers were safely out of the building, Rick was told to evacuate the premises.  “Not a chance!” he said, as he rushed back in to search for any other stragglers.  Rick was last seen helping people evacuate on the 10^th Floor; He never made it out.  Rick Rescorla was credited in saving 2,694 lives. 

Each year, we gather in the Meadow for Rosh Hashanah and take time to reflect upon our Jewish identity and Jewish community.  I’d like to be so bold to refute that premise.  It’s a misnomer to call Rosh Hashanah the Jewish New Year.   Today is not for us, it’s for all of humanity.  Rosh Hashanah is the world’s birthday.  Today marks the creation of the entire world.

We might think our Torah should begin with the story of Abraham and Sarah, the first Jewish people, but that is not the case.  Our Bible opens much earlier with Adam and Eve.  This serves as a reminder that each of us traces our line back to the very first human beings.  For, as our rabbis teach, “if you save one life, you’ve saved an entire world.”[iii]

Rick Rescorla lived that dictum till his dying breath.  He realized that if just one secretary, banker, custodian, or Vice President didn’t make it home, entire worlds would be destroyed.  Rick didn’t know and couldn’t know all 2,694 people he saved that day, but he believed in their humanity and of his obligation to take care of them.  We might not be as brave or courageous as Rick, but we Jews are obligated to look after each member of our broader human family.

It was late morning on September 11^th when Jacque Pinto’s[iv] flight from Italy made an emergency landing.  She was supposed to land in New York, but was diverted to Gander International Airport in Newfoundland, Canada.  Some of you may have seen the musical “Come from Away” which documents this beautiful story.  Thirty-eight commercial flights touched down at Gander that day.  The 10,000 residents didn’t have enough hotel space for the 7,000 stranded passengers.  And so, a call went out to “lend a hand and do what you can.” 

The “plane people” were welcomed with open arms, warmth, and love.  Locals provided meals, bedding, and showers.  Schools, churches, and legion halls were converted into dormitories.  People welcomed strangers into their homes, pharmacies filled prescriptions for free, and their ice rink was converted into “the largest walk-in freezer in Canada.”  When asked about their generosity, a resident responded, “For us, it was like every other day… You don’t turn your back on people in need.”

The residents of Gander didn’t care about a person’s religion, nationality, race, income, or if they were part of their social circle.  Whether they knew it or not, they lived by our Jewish command: “love the stranger for you were strangers in the land of Egypt.”[v]  In our Jewish tradition, we show love by acting, by taking care and supporting those in need.  How embarrassing that twenty-five years later, we treat our Canadian neighbors with such contempt.

Rosh Hashanah is the most universal of all our Jewish holidays.  Our rabbis sprinkled many prayers in today’s service that speak of our responsibility towards our human family.  No prayer better highlights this idea than three paragraphs called uvechin, “And so…”[vi]  Earlier this evening, you may have stumbled across these unique words during the silent prayer.  I call these three uvchein paragraphs, “our Jewish sandwich.”  The first paragraph addresses all of humanity, the second paragraph, the meat, speaks of the Jewish people, while the third describes all righteous human beings.  This prayer begins and ends with our obligation to all people.

Uvechein[vii] is a utopian vision where God is revered, respect given to the Jewish community, and where righteousness overcomes all evil.  Our rabbis teach that this vision can only be achieved through action.  As a Jewish community, we are a small part of a very large world, but nonetheless, we are commanded to do our part, to show kindness to all people, support the most vulnerable, and embody righteousness in all that we do.  We might not be as generous as the people of Gander, but we can open our wallets, provide needed necessities, volunteer, and fill our days with acts of loving kindness.  For we know that one small act can change a person’s life.

That’s what happened 25 years ago. Usman Farman, the 22-year-old Pakistani Muslim, ran from 7 World Trade Center, when we tripped over his feet, and fell onto his back.  Dozens of people ignored his plight, running around him as the South Tower began to collapse.  Usman thought he was a goner when a man approached him.  This wasn’t just any man, but a Chasidic Jew, with a big beard, long Payos, and a big black coat.  The man grabbed the pendant that hung from Usman’s neck and read the Muslim prayer filled with Arabic writing.  The Jew than extended his hand and with a thick Brooklyn accent said to him, “Brother, if you don’t mind, there is a cloud of glass coming at us, grab my hand and let’s get the hell out of here.” 

Usman reached for his hand, and they both ran far from Ground Zero.  In the mayhem, the two lost each other, but Usman later reflected upon that moment, saying, “Regardless of who we are and where we come from, we only have each other.” 

Those days after 9/11 were a dark time for our country. Islamophobia dramatically increased.  Muslims were afraid to wear headscarves in public and whispered when speaking Arabic for fear of reprisal.  There were attacks on Muslims and a backlash against the building of any new mosque. 

Twenty-five years later, we watch as antisemitism rises in our country, whether by hateful slurs, microaggressions, or our Jewish institutions being vandalized.  We worry about verbal or even physical attacks.  We are scared to be open and honest about our Judaism or our Jewish identity.  How embarrassing that twenty-five years ago we treated Muslims this way?  How outrageous that this type of hatred festers today against our community?

Today is Rosh Hashanah, our antidote to disunity, fear, and isolation.  Rosh Hashanah is our pivot, our reset, from a time of fear to a time of hope.  Rosh Hashanah is the Birthday of the World - our reminder that we are all one human family.  

This New Year may we be brave and courageous like Rick Rescorla and always do our part to take care of one another. 

This New Year may we be generous in spirit and in action like those in Gander and never turn our back on people in need.

This New Year may we and our allies not ever remain silent about antisemitism or any type of hatred.  Like the Chasidic Jew, may we recognize that we are all one human family.

This New Year may the world recognize our obligation to each other.  As Usman Farman reminds us, “we only have one another.” Amen.

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[i] https://www.cnn.com/2002/US/08/30/ar911.usman.farman/index.html

[ii] https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/2001/10/28/a-tower-of-courage/c53e8244-3754-440f-84f8-51f841aff6c8/

[iii] Babylonian Talmud, Sanhedrin 37a

[iv] https://www.911memorial.org/connect/blog/lend-hand-do-what-you-can-remembering-generosity-gander

[v] Leviticus 19:34

[vi] Rosh Hashanah Machzor, third prayer of the Amidah.  See pp. 49-51 of Mishkan HaNefesh Rosh Hashanah

[vii] See commentary on p. 48 of Mishkan HaNefesh Rosh Hashanah

Love is the Answer - Yom Kippur Morning Sermon 5786

 

The 1970’s were a fearful time for our Jewish community.  Just a generation or two after the Holocaust, there was once again trepidation about our demographic decline.  As recently as 1920, less than 1% of marriages in our Jewish community were outside the faith, but by the 1970’s, 30% of Jews were marrying non-Jews, and that the number was rising steadily. 

Our Jewish community’s response to these changes was fear, anger, and indifference.  Many leaders openly condemned interfaith relationships while some parents sat shiva when their child married a non-Jew.  Almost no rabbi in the country would officiate at an interfaith wedding and non-Jewish partners felt most unwelcome in our synagogues. 

This summer, I read “Above All, We are Jews” written by Michael Meyer, a biography about the life of Rabbi Alexander Schindler.  Rabbi Schindler, the president of our Reform Jewish Movement from 1973 to 1995, took a different, radical response.[i]  As a refugee from Nazi Germany, Rabbi Schindler wished to restore our Jewish community.  He believed that the only way to do that was through Ahavat Yisrael, a love of fellow Jews.[ii]  It was not fear, hate, or indifference that propelled him, but a love of every single Jew regardless of who they married or who they loved.  Rabbi Schindler urged our Reform Movement to welcome interfaith families warmly and to encourage them to raise their children as Jews.

Rabbi Schindler also saw that there were too many barriers for non-Jewish partners.  They too should be invited to recite the blessing over the Shabbat candles, to hold the Torah scroll, and to serve as leaders of our synagogues. 

Alongside the Central Conference of American Rabbis, Rabbi Schindler worked to broaden our recognition of who is a Jew.  Through patrilineal descent, babies born to either a Jewish mother or a Jewish father would now be considered as Jews in our synagogues.

And when Beth Chayim Chadashim, a LGBTQ synagogue in Los Angeles, approached our Union to be admitted as a congregation, Rabbi Schindler accepted them.  He urged Reform Rabbis to welcome LGBTQ individuals into our synagogues.[iii]

Our Jewish community has changed dramatically for the better since the 1970’s thanks to the leadership of Rabbi Alexander Schindler.  But we must not forget that these changes were not easy or simple. Rabbi Schindler received deep critique for his stances.  Reform rabbis believed that we would be at the periphery of Judaism.  Jewish leaders were outraged by his plan to “dilute” the Jewish community.  Others thought we were spending far too much effort on “outreach” instead of “in reach to Jews by birth.” 

Rabbi Schindler’s response was love.  Ahavat Yisrael, the love of our Jewish people, as well as the love of our fellow human beings.  Because of love, we are a stronger and a more vibrant Jewish community today.

Unfortunately, we are living at a time when love is not the prevailing emotion.  There is too much hate and too much anger. ICE agents terrorize citizens and non-citizens alike.  SNAP benefits are taken away from those who are the hungriest.  Medical research is being decimated, vaccines demonized.  The justice department indicts the president’s enemies and the FCC comes after those speaking their truth.  While the National Guard marches in our streets.

This is not who we are as a country.  These are not our American values.  We are not a perfect country, far from it, but at our best, we stand for democracy, equality, and freedom.  We are a country who takes care of one another.  We are a nation of immigrants who welcomes the refugee as the Statue of Liberty beckons.

As our country changes so rapidly, so many of us are unsure of what to do.  How do we combat hate?  How do we lift up the American and Jewish values that we care so deeply about?

Our Jewish tradition teaches that we combat hate with love. This year, I read Rabbi Shai Held new book, in which he teaches, “Judaism is about many things, but above all else Judaism is about love.”[iv]  Over the course of these High Holy Days, I seek to answer the same question in different ways, “How do I be a Jew in this moment?”  I’ve already shared my thoughts around community, wrestling, and grief.  My answer this morning: “to be a Jew is one who loves.”

Our first command to love is not the easiest, but perhaps it’s the one you know best, V’havata et Adonai Eloheicha, “You shall love Adonai Your God.”  What’s most surprising is how we express that love of God.  We convey our love by “walking in God’s ways.”  Just as God clothes the naked, visits the sick, comforts the mourner, buries the dead, so too must we.[v]  Even more than that, we learn in the Torah that God loves the most vulnerable.  God loves the orphan, the widow, and the stranger.  We are commanded to love who God loves.[vi] 

Our role as Jews is to transform hate into love.  We do that through action.  We love by taking care of the immigrant, by feeding the hungry, by lifting up the poor, and by protecting the persecuted.  When we can no longer rely on our government to protect and take care of its citizens, it’s now up to us. 

Unfortunately, hate is not the only emotion that many of us are feeling at this moment.  There is also a sense of helplessness and indifference.  Elie Wiesel once said: “The opposite of love is not hate, it’s indifference.”[vii]  Indifference can be found in so many ways.  When we choose not to act, that’s indifference.  When we won’t figure out how to make change, that’s indifference.  When we yell angerly at the news, but go right back to our normal lives, that too is indifference.

A few weeks ago, we welcomed Catalina Rodriguez Lima, the Director of the Mayor’s Office of Immigrant Affairs to speak at our Friday evening service.  That’s in recognition of our second command to love, “to love the stranger.”   Miss Rodriguez Lima spoke movingly about the plight of immigrants and the work our city is doing to keep them safe.  She concluded her remarks with a warning.  Too many immigrants no longer feel safe being in public or attending a rally for fear of their or their family’s legal status.   She urged us, “Those of you who have the ability to act, must step up for those of us who can’t.”  Not all of us are able to act, but many of us have the privilege and the ability to make a difference.

Our actions can be both large and small.  Rabbi Betsy Teutsch recently shared that her husband David broke his leg and was transported home from the hospital via ambulette.  A few days later, she ran into her next-door neighbor in the driveway.  She explained to her neighbor that David had broken his leg during a bike accident.  She was flabbergasted when, her neighbor responded, “Oh, yes, I did see that he came home in an ambulette, but I didn’t want to intrude.”

Rabbi Teutsch shares her response, “Get over it folks!  If your neighbor comes home in an ambulette, do not stand on ceremony.  Offers to help are not intrusive; they are what good neighbors do.”[viii] 

As Jews, we are also commanded to “love our neighbor.” Rabbi Yaakov Tzvi Mecklenburg, a 19^th century biblical commentator, believes that we love our neighbor by being a faithful friend.[ix]  He gives examples of what we would expect of a friend: “to love us, to treat us with respect, to seek out our well-being, to share in our sorrow, to welcome us warmly into their home, to judge us favorably, to gladly go through a little trouble for our sake.”  When our neighbors are in need, we don’t remain indifferent.  We aren’t  intruding when we reach out and show we care. 

There is a third emotion that many of us are feeling: fear.  Fear and retaliation are being used as weapons against us.  Too many pillars of our society are being culled: the press, universities, philanthropists, cities, governors, law firms, and businesses.  We’re so fearful, and sometimes rightly so, of our government contracts, federal funding, non-profit status, bad press, a loss of job, or God Forbid, a justice department investigation.

There is also a real fear of our physical and emotional safety.  A few weeks ago, I was invited to attend a rally for Kilmar Ábrego García just before he was to enter the George Fallon Federal Building for his ICE hearing.  Although the rally was scheduled at 6:30am, downtown, that really wasn’t my concern.  I grew fearful about my presence there.  Would I be seen as a rabble rouser?  Would I be entered onto a government watch list?  Was I being crazy or would I be next? 

I did decide to attend the rally along with four other rabbis, a dozen clergy people, and hundreds of others.  Luckily, I don’t have nearly as much to fear as do many other members of our community; trans individuals, immigrants, black individuals, and so many others who fear for their physical safety.

I know it’s cliché, but I think back to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr, John Lewis, and the dozens of other brave civil rights leaders, including Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, who marched across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama.  There was real fear: fear of violence, fear of their livelihoods, and yet they bravely marched.

We Jews fight fear with love.  When we are afraid, we often wish to flee.  Judaism teaches us to do the opposite.  We are to run towards the people and the places that make us most afraid.[x]  When we are filled with fear, we show up with love.  We visit the sick, we comfort the mourner, we raise our voices, and we stand with the persecuted.  As Rabbi Shai Held teaches, “The goal is not to be fearless.  The goal is to learn to sit with our fears… Certain things may understandably scare us, but we can learn to stop being governed by fear.”[xi]  We do this by showing up, by gathering in community, and by expressing our love.

During the last weeks of 1995, Rabbi Alexander Schindler addressed our Reform Movement for the final time.  He shared these words: “My core conviction, the mainspring of all my actions, the driving power of my life is Ahavat Yisrael, a love of my fellow Jews which knows no limits.”  Over the course of his presidency, Rabbi Schindler, provided us with a different path forward.  It was not easy or simple, but because of his leadership and vision, our Jewish community is more diverse, more open, more welcoming, more loving, and more vibrant.  His response to hate, indifference, and fear, was love.

At this moment, so many of us are unsure of how to act.  How do we respond to our changing country?  How do we want to use our energy?  Should we sit in fear, stew in anger, or remain indifferent to the plight of others?  Or do we wish to love?  Our tradition commands us to love our neighbor, to love the stranger, to love and walk in God’s ways.  It may seem naïve to fight hate or fear with love.  But, Dr. King reminds us: "Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that."  May we choose love.  May we choose kindness.  May we choose compassion.  May we choose rebuke.  May we choose fortitude.  May we choose bravery.  May we choose love.  Amen.

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[i] “Above All, We Are Jews: A Biography of Rabbi Alexander Schindler,” by Michael A Meyer

[ii] “Above all, we are Jews,” p. 177

[iii] “Above all, we are Jews,” p. 125-128

[iv] “Judaism is About Love,” p. 7, by Rabbi Shai Held

[v] “Judaism is About Love,” p. 227

[vi] “Judaism is About Love,” p. 360

[vii] Elie Wiesel, US News and World Report, 27 October 1986

[viii] Rabbi Betsy Teutsch, “Connecting with Neighbors,” September 2, 2024, evolve.reconstructingjudaism.org/connecting-with-neighbors

[ix] “Judaism is About Love,” p. 113

[x] “Judaism is About Love,” p. 230

[xi] “Judaism is About Love” p. 233