Year: 2026

Between Heaven and Earth

This week asks something profound of us.

It asks us to hold wonder and grief, hope and heartbreak, memory and responsibility, all at the same time.

Just days ago, NASA’s Artemis II began its journey, circling the moon and sending back images that stop us in our tracks. There is something almost spiritual in those photographs. They expand our sense of what is possible. They remind us how small we are, and at the same time, how capable we can be.

And yet, even as we look upward, we are pulled sharply back to Earth.

This past Sunday, an Iranian ballistic missile smashed into an apartment building in Haifa, killing four members of the same family: Vladimir Gershovitz and Lena Ostrovsky Gershovitz, their son Dimitri “Dima,” and his wife Lucille-Jane. Dima was part of our Reform community, having grown up at the Israeli Reform Movement’s Leo Baeck School in Haifa. Their loss is not abstract. It is personal, and like all such deaths, it is devastating.

At the same time, we are living through a fragile, short-term ceasefire between the United States and Iran. We want to believe in it. We need to believe in it. However, we are not naïve for we know how tenuous such moments can be.

So what does Judaism ask of us in a week like this?

It asks us not to choose between awe and anguish, but to live within both.

That is why, in these past weeks since the war with Iran began, we have added an extra candle before we light the Shabbat candles. Not because light erases darkness, but because it insists that darkness is not the final word. A candle for hope. A candle for peace. A candle for the sacred worth of every human life, created b’tzelem Elohim, in the image of God.

This evening, our Temple Beth Or (TBO) Tikkun Olam Committee will host a special “Earth Day Shabbat,” grounding us in our responsibility to care for the world we have been given. In this week’s parasha, Sh’mini, holiness emerges not in abstraction, but in the details of how we live. Holiness is not removed from the world. It is enacted within it. In how we care for all living creatures, how we protect, how we choose to live.

Then, on Sunday, we turn to memory in a way that is uniquely our own. Per TBO’s custom, we will gather in the sanctuary for our annual 12-hour reading of names of those who perished in the Holocaust: “Unto Every Person There is a Name.” Hour after hour, name after name, we restore dignity to those whose lives were taken and whose stories must never be forgotten. At 6:30 pm, TBO’s own Kathryn Struminger will share her family’s Holocaust story, and we will conclude at 7:00 pm with prayers and songs of commemoration.

What, then, binds all of this together?

It is the quiet, stubborn insistence of Jewish life that even in a fractured world, we are called to respond with meaning.

This is not easy work. It never has been. It is sacred work.

To look at the vastness of the heavens and feel humility.
To face human suffering and refuse indifference.
To care for the earth as something entrusted to us.
To remember those who came before us, not as numbers, but as individuals who had been known by their names, personalities, deeds, and so much more.
And to live our lives with purpose and meaning.

The Yiddish poet and Holocaust survivor Abraham Sutzkever gives voice to this in the poem that follows. He writes of a friendship that stretches across time and place, a bond that endures even in the face of loss. It is, in many ways, a reflection of who we are as a people: bound to one another, across generations, carrying memory, carrying hope, carrying responsibility.

We hope you will join us tonight for a very special Erev Shabbat and then again this coming Sunday as we gather not to escape the world, but to meet it with courage, with community, with song, with commemoration.

A Remarkable Friendship Exists (Poem by Abraham Sutzkever, translated from the Yiddish by Maia Evrona)

A remarkable friendship exists, when both friends

inhabit different centuries, different countries.

People meet like wandering roots beneath

treetops split in two: Are you that friend? –Yes, I am he.

There is a friendship like a biblical scroll, which you find

in caves and which joy and tenderness can unwind.

Unfurl it—Then it will narrate our saga too. Otherwise,

it will flake away and fall to pieces in your fingers.

There are friends whose bond is stronger than love, than hate,

twinned together by fate, they must accompany each other:

The friendship when trained hounds sniff out a hiding place

and though one friend can escape, he remains with the other.

Creator, you have gifted me friends of all sorts,

and among them a special one, who stays most devoted:

At dawn, he will rise early to water my garden

so I may distribute his grapes among spirits.

Happy Birthday, Mom!

Five days ago, on March 15th, marked the sixteenth yahrzeit of my mother. And today, March 20th, would have been her eighty-sixth birthday. She died just five days before turning seventy.

Today is also the first day of spring, the spring equinox.

There is something in that convergence that I cannot ignore.

Jewish time asks us to hold memory and renewal in the same breath. We do not wait until grief is finished to begin again. We do not wait until the heart is fully repaired to notice what is blooming. Instead, we stand in that in-between place, where loss and possibility meet.

Kohelet (Ecclesiastes) teaches, “לַכֹּל זְמָן וְעֵת לְכָל חֵפֶץ תַּחַת הַשָּׁמָיִם” — “For everything there is a season, and a time for every purpose under heaven” (Ecclesiastes 3:1).

And yet, life rarely parcels itself so neatly. The seasons overlap. The calendar folds in on itself. A yahrzeit can sit beside a birthday. Winter can turn toward spring even as we are still carrying what has been.

The equinox itself is a moment of balance. Equal light and equal darkness. Not the absence of night, but its partnership with day.

That is what this day feels like to me.

Sixteen years of missing my mother. At the same time, the quiet, insistent return of light. The memory of who she was. The question of who I am still becoming because she lived.

The psalmist cries out, “מִן־הַמֵּצַר קָרָאתִי יָּהּ עָנָנִי בַמֶּרְחָב יָהּ” — “From the narrow place I called out to God; God answered me with expansiveness” (Psalm 118:5).

Grief can be a narrow place. It can constrict, press in, make the world feel smaller than it once was. And yet, somehow, over time, something widens. Not because the loss disappears, but because love insists on taking up space. Because memory becomes not only what we carry, but what carries us.

Spring does not erase winter. It emerges from within it.

Perhaps that is what we mean when we speak about renewal, about rebirth. Not a return to what was, but the courage to become something new while still carrying what has been.

This morning in my pre-Shabbat Rabbi’s Corner message, I wrote about courage as an act of holiness. This evening, I am realizing that this may be one of the holiest forms of courage we are asked to practice: the courage to begin again without letting go of what we have loved.

To allow grief and growth to coexist.
To let memory root us, even as we reach toward what is still unfolding.

Rabbi Nachman of Bratslav taught, “כָּל הָעוֹלָם כֻּלּוֹ גֶּשֶׁר צַר מְאֹד, וְהָעִקָּר לֹא לְפַחֵד כְּלָל” — “The whole world is a very narrow bridge, and the essential thing is not to be afraid at all.”

Perhaps not being afraid does not mean that we are untouched by loss. Perhaps it means that even on the narrow bridge, we keep walking. That we trust there is something on the other side of winter. That we allow ourselves to step into the unknown with tenderness, with memory, with love.

Tonight, I am aware that my mother does not get any older. She will forever remain five days shy of 70. However, I become older each and every second of the day.

Tonight, I am also carrying her with me in a different way.

I will wear her dress that was made for her when she was in her early 20’s – a dress that is almost as old as I.
I will be wrapped in her tallit, made for her by my sister-in-law, Marilyn.
I will be adorned with her jewelry, bequeathed to her by my grandfather, Bill.

I also look like my mother. I see her face every time I look in the mirror.

But more than that, I carry in my heart the love she lavished upon me. I try to live the values she taught me, not only in what I believe, but in the choices I make, in the ways I show up, and in the love I extend to others. And I carry her through the quiet, enduring gift of memory.

Not as costume. Not as memory alone. But as something that still lives. Something that still moves. Something that still accompanies me into this moment.

Maybe this is what rebirth can look like.

Not becoming someone entirely new, untethered from what has been. But allowing what we have loved to continue to live through us. In what we wear. In how we bless. In the ways we show up for one another. In our hearts, our minds, our memories, and our actions and deeds of love.

The past does not disappear. It becomes part of the fabric of who we are becoming.

So on this night of equinox, of balance, of beginnings that come intertwined with endings, perhaps the invitation is this:

To honor what has been.
To bless what is.
And to find the courage, again and again, to step into what is still becoming.

Happy birthday, Mom!

Courage As An Act of Holiness

Earlier this week, I found myself walking through a space not yet complete, and yet already filled with presence. In the historic Presidio in San Francisco, overlooking the quiet vastness of the bay, a new institution is taking shape: the Courage Museum (A project of Futures Without Violence). It is still being built, still finding its physical form, and yet its spirit is already unmistakably alive.

This is not a museum in the traditional sense. It is envisioned as a kind of laboratory for human transformation, a space that asks not only what has happened, but what might yet be possible. Its founders, including Esta Soler of Futures Without Violence, (and a member of URJ Congregation Emanuel in San Francisco) speak of it as an effort to spark a movement of young changemakers, to turn courage into action before violence ever takes root.

I was there with a group of rabbis as part of my Reform Rabbis’ conference (CCAR). We were invited not simply to observe, but to learn, be inspired, and to bear witness: to stories of gun violence, sexual violence, racial hatred, harm inflicted in the very places meant to be safest. Stories of antisemitism, isolation, pain carried quietly and for far too long. It could have been overwhelming, except that the telling itself was suffused with something else, something that felt like insistence: that these stories matter, that they must be heard, and that listening itself can begin to shift the world.

I was mesmerized.

We were joined by a panel of four Jewish teens from a local Hebrew Day School. They spoke about courage, about what it means to inherit a broken world and still believe in the possibility of repair. They were articulate in a way that felt almost startling, not because of rehearsal and practice, but because of clarity. They did not speak in abstractions. They spoke about responsibility. About empathy. About the quiet, difficult work of really hearing another person’s story. They spoke their truths.

As I listened, I found myself wondering whether courage, in their generation, may look different than it has in our own. Perhaps it is less about certainty, more about openness. Less about having the answers, more about the willingness to stay present to questions that do not resolve easily. There was something in their voices that suggested not naiveté, but a kind of moral imagination, a capacity to envision a world not yet built and to begin, even now, to work toward a future bright with the promise of hope.

Then, as if on cue, we turn this week to the opening word of the book of Leviticus: Vayikra, “And God called.”

“וַיִּקְרָא אֶל־מֹשֶׁה וַיְדַבֵּר ה’ אֵלָיו מֵאֹהֶל מוֹעֵד לֵאמֹר׃”
“And God called to Moses and spoke to him from the Tent of Meeting, saying…” (Leviticus 1:1).

The Torah does not begin this book with action, but with a call. A reaching outward. A voice that invites response.

In our tradition, holiness is not something distant or abstract. It is something we create through attention, through relationship, through the ways we choose to show up in the world. To be called is not only to hear, but to answer. To be called is to recognize that the work of bringing sanctity into the world is not reserved for another time or another generation. It is for each and every one of us, here and now.

Standing in that unfinished museum, listening to those young voices, I felt that call in a new way. Not as something grand or distant, but as something immediate and human. The call to listen more deeply. The call to cultivate empathy, cultivate courage. The call to take seriously the possibility that transformation begins not with systems alone, but with the courage to encounter one another, fully and honestly.

Holiness, then, may begin here. Not only in ritual, though it lives there as well, but in the spaces where we allow ourselves to be changed by what we hear. In the quiet, demanding work of seeing another person’s humanity and refusing to turn away.

There is so much work that remains. And none of it can be done alone.

As we gather this Shabbat, perhaps the question is not only whether we hear the call of Vayikra, but how we choose to answer it. What it might mean, in this moment, to become people who do not wait for a finished world, but instead step, with courage, with empathy, and with open hearts and minds, into the work of building it together.

Shabbat Shalom!

What Gifts Did You Bring?

The most meaningful gifts we can offer others are rarely material – they are the gifts of our presence, the gifts of compassion, understanding, and kindness.

I grew up in New Jersey, far from both sets of grandparents who lived in New England. Back then, travel to visit was a journey and a real effort. We saw my grandparents only two or three times a year.

After my maternal grandfather died, my grandmother remarried a Holocaust survivor from Germany who worked for Hasbro Toys. When they would pull into our driveway after their long drive to visit us, my four brothers, sister, and I would race out to the car, bursting with excitement after so much time apart. We would exchange hugs and kisses, and often the first thing out of our mouths was, “What gifts did you bring us?”

What gifts did you bring us? My parents were appalled.

And yet, we adored my grandparents, not for their physical gifts, but for their boundless love and their unwavering acceptance. We were young children who had not yet matured enough to express gratitude for the truest gifts they gave us, the gift of themselves, their presence, and their open hearts. We never had the chance to fully express this to my grandmother. She died of metastatic breast cancer just before I turned sixteen.

In this week’s Torah portion, Terumah, from the Book of Exodus, God instructs Moses to tell the Israelites: ‘Tell the Israelite people to bring Me gifts; you shall accept gifts for Me from every person whose heart is so moved’ (Exodus 25:2).” It should be noted that the name of the portion itself, Terumah, literally means “gifts.”

These gifts were for the building of the mishkan, the portable sanctuary. Their purpose was not simply to create a beautiful sacred space, but to allow each person to invest something of themselves in a shared holy project. In giving, the people expressed gratitude for their redemption from Egypt and for the covenant they were about to enter at Sinai. Through these voluntary offerings, they began to understand what it meant to become Am Yisrael, the People of Israel, a people bound to one another and to God.

Of course, God does not need gifts. God does not require gold, fabric, or precious stones, nor even a sanctuary, in order to dwell among us. The gifts were never for God. They were for the people themselves. In the act of giving, hearts were shaped, relationships were formed, and holiness took root.

One of the enduring teachings of Terumah is that the most meaningful gifts in our lives are rarely material. The deepest blessings come from the people who show up for us, who offer their time, their care, their compassion, and their presence. These are the gifts that sustain us as individuals and bind us together as a community.

Life is ephemeral. We do not always realize in the moment the magnitude of what we are being given. Parashat Terumah reminds us to notice, to receive with humility, and to respond with gratitude. To honor the gifts in our lives is itself a sacred act.

This teaching feels especially resonant this week, as our three monotheistic traditions enter sacred seasons that call us to give from the heart, each in our own language and ritual grammar. For our Muslim friends, Wednesday evening marked the beginning of Ramadan, the most holy month in Islam. This sacred time is devoted to spiritual reflection, self-discipline, prayer, and deepened responsibility to community. For our Christian neighbors, Wednesday was Ash Wednesday, the start of Lent, a forty-day journey of humility, repentance, prayer, fasting, and almsgiving. And for our Jewish community, Wednesday ushered in the month of Adar, the month of Purim, when one of our central mitzvot is the giving of tzedakah and gifts to others.

Parashat Terumah teaches that holiness is not built through obligation alone, but through offerings that come from a willing heart. In different ways, these sacred seasons ask the same of us. They invite us to step beyond ourselves, to notice the needs of others, and to recognize that spiritual life is inseparable from how we care for one another.

It is no coincidence that in the week we read a Torah portion devoted to gifts freely given, our faith traditions are each emphasizing generosity, humility, and responsibility for the vulnerable. While our practices and beliefs are distinct, the moral vision beneath them is shared. Difference itself becomes a gift when it leads us toward deeper compassion, greater understanding, and a more just world.
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May we learn to see the people in our lives, and the people beyond our own communities, as gifts. May the offerings we bring, of kindness, compassion, and presence, help build a world worthy of God’s abiding presence. “V’asu li mikdash, v’shachanti b’tocham – let them build Me a sanctuary, that I may dwell among them.” (Exodus 25:8)

Shabbat Shalom!

LGBTQ+ Rights are Jewish Rights

Shortly after I arrived in Raleigh, I encountered an unexpected and deeply sobering phenomenon. On multiple occasions, different people reached out to schedule appointments with me to ask how to apply for asylum in Canada. They heard that I am a dual U.S. – Canadian citizen and wanted to explore whether that path might be available to them and their families.

Each of these individuals shared something significant in common. Every one of them identifies as a member of the LGBTQ+ community. Each expressed fear that their rights to healthcare, marriage equality, bodily autonomy, and legal protections will be rolled back or eliminated under the current US administration. Each worried that as more federal protections for LGBTQ+ people are weakened or returned to individual states, they could lose access to employment, face barriers to housing, be denied equal benefits, or be forced to choose between their livelihood and living openly as their full selves. Many spoke of a growing fear that discrimination, harassment, and even violence could once again become sanctioned by law or tolerated by society.

A great deal has changed in the past half century, and we should never minimize the progress that has been achieved. At the same time, we still have a long way to go before true equality, safety, and full inclusion are a lived reality for our LGBTQ+ community. As of today, the ACLU is tracking 384 anti LGBTQ+ bills across the United States. Here in North Carolina alone, there are currently seven anti LGBTQ+ bills on the state’s legislative docket. While not all of these bills will ultimately become law, the very fact that they appear on legislative agendas causes harm. It sends a message of fear and exclusion that impacts not only LGBTQ+ individuals and families, but all of us who believe in dignity, justice, and the sanctity of human life.

For decades, the Reform Movement has spoken truth to power, stood with the marginalized, and advocated boldly on behalf of LGBTQ+ rights. Even with so much progress, there is still much work to be done. The Reform Movement’s long history and clear commitments to LGBTQ+ inclusion and justice can be explored through its published positions and educational resources. In recent years, the Central Conference of American Rabbis published Mishkan Ga’avah: Where Pride Dwells, a sacred collection that celebrates and affirms the achievements of the LGBTQ+ community. Through liturgy, poetry, prayer, and reflection, the book frames LGBTQ+ dignity firmly within a Reform Jewish spiritual and ethical context.

Some may ask why the Jewish community, and particularly the Reform Movement, has been so deeply committed to advocating for LGBTQ+ rights. Others may question why we teach about these issues so openly in our synagogues and religious schools.

Our answer is found at the very heart of Torah. Judaism teaches us that we are commanded to speak up for those whose voices are too often silenced, to pursue justice relentlessly, to challenge systems that cause harm, even when doing so is uncomfortable, and to stand up for what is right and just. Sometimes this means questioning accepted norms, especially when those norms treat human beings as “other” or “less than.” There is a profound difference between diversity and inclusion, and liberation and justice. Diversity may invite us into the room. Justice insists that every person’s full humanity is honored once we are there.

The Torah articulates this most powerfully in the language of sacred worth. “God created humanity in the divine image, creating it in the image of God, creating them male and female.” (Genesis 1:27). This teaching, that every human being is created b’tzelem Elohim, in the image of God, demands more than tolerance. It demands affirmation, protection, and love – precisely because every single human being is imbued with the spark of the Divine.

This week’s Torah portion, Parashat Yitro from the Book of Exodus, brings us to Mount Sinai and the giving of the Ten Commandments. Revelation at Sinai is not selective. The entire Jewish people stand together, every soul present and every voice counted. The rabbis tell a midrash, a story, to emphasize that every single person was included in both the giving and the receiving of Torah. They teach that the Divine voice at Sinai did not speak in a single voice alone. Rather, God appeared in many voices, so that each person could hear Torah in the way they were able to personally perceive and receive it. Covenant belongs to all. No one is excluded from standing at the mountain. No one is erased from the moment of sacred encounter. That vision stands in direct opposition to any system that seeks to deny the dignity, safety, or humanity of LGBTQ+ individuals.

We live in a world that still does not fully embrace the fullness of the humanity of those in the LGBTQ+ community. Here in the United States, we are witnessing a growing movement to erode hard won protections, to threaten the sanctity of LGBTQ+ lives, to limit access to healthcare and family benefits, to undermine marriage equality, and to endanger the safety and well-being of transgender children and adults. These realities are not abstract. They affect people we love.

This weekend at Temple Beth Or, we continue a long-standing decades old tradition (begun by our beloved Rabbi Emerita Lucy Dinner) with our weekend-long Sex Education Retreat for our eighth and ninth grade students. As part of this meaningful and values driven weekend, we are honored to welcome David Weitzman from Keshet as our guest speaker for our community-wide Erev Shabbat service, for our Confirmation students, and as a featured educator throughout the retreat. Keshet is a national organization dedicated to LGBTQ+ equality in Jewish life. David’s presence allows us to engage in these conversations thoughtfully and faithfully across generations.

The conversations I have been having over the past year (since the beginning of the current U.S. administration) have been deeply painful. They carry fear, uncertainty, and the longing to be safe and seen. At the same time, they remind me why education, advocacy, and communal responsibility matter so deeply. The Sex Education Retreat weekend is not separate from these concerns. It is one of the ways we lovingly teach our youth, and ourselves, that Judaism insists on dignity, safety, and the sacred worth of every human being.

Last week, I wrote about the danger of being a bystander. When it comes to LGBTQ+ justice, we cannot stand on the sidelines. We are called, as a community, to stand up, to speak out, and to advocate with compassion and courage. Judaism does not ask us to be comfortable. It asks us to respond. We live our values when we show up for one another and insist, together, on the sacred worth of every human life.

I close with this prayer, which remind us why we gather and why this work matters:

“We come together this Shabbat, each bringing to this sanctuary a private world of hopes, of fears, of dreams. Some of us are burdened by anxieties and cares that all but crush our faith in the future. Others have hearts filled with happiness, grateful for the joys of the past week, yet aware that even the most fortunate are vulnerable before the mystery of tomorrow. Every life is a unique blending of joy and sorrow, of fulfillment and frustration.

Beneath our uniqueness we are all bound together by our common humanity. All of us most deeply yearn for the blessings of freedom and peace.”
(Kol HaNeshamah: Shabbat Vehagim).

Please join us this evening for our special Erev Shabbat Service this evening with guest speaker, David Weitzman from Keshet.

Shabbat Shalom!

Bearing Witness Commands Responsibility – Do Not be a Bystander

We pray for a world where God no longer cries nor grieves over what is taking place because we have figured out how to live with one another in compassion, kindness, harmony, justice, and peace.

This week, my heart feels heavy – because this week has required us to bear witness.

Bearing witness is not simply noticing what is happening around us. It is allowing what we see to enter us and change us. Judaism teaches that once our eyes have seen, once our ears have heard, and once our hearts have discerned what can no longer be ignored, neutrality is no longer an option.

For us as Jews, bearing witness commands responsibility.

This understanding is not theoretical for me. It was instilled in me at a young age. My father taught my siblings and me that Judaism does not permit the luxury of looking away. He taught us that once your eyes have seen and your ears have heard, you are commanded to respond. Bearing witness is not optional. It obligates action. One of his favorite Jewish teachings was Leviticus 19:16 from the Torah which names this obligation clearly:

“Lo ta’amod al dam re’echa – do not stand idly by while your neighbor bleeds.” Jewish tradition understands this as more than a prohibition against indifference. It is a command rooted in seeing. Once your eyes have seen and your heart has heard, you must act, to do your part to repair what is broken.

This week, we bore witness to many things.

On Saturday, on a brutally cold day in Raleigh, nineteen Buddhist monks entered the city on the 91st day of their 2300-mile “Walk for Peace.” This was neither a political nor a religious demonstration. It was an offering rooted in their core values of peace, compassion, and mindfulness, extended to a nation hungry for all three. North Caroline Governor Josh Stein declared January 24th “Walk for Peace Day” as thousands gathered at the North Carolina Capitol to greet them. In his remarks, he acknowledged not only those present, but the many more following their journey from afar via social media. He said, “You are bringing people hope. You are inspiring people at a time when so many are in need of inspiration… In our heart of hearts, we don’t want to feel on guard against our neighbors. We want to come together… No matter your faith or where you call home, we all have a role to play in bringing about peace.”

How striking that the monks arrived in Raleigh this particular week.

Earlier that same day, in Minneapolis, Alex Pretti, a thirty-seven-year-old ICU nurse for the United States Department of Veterans Affairs, was shot and killed by federal immigration agents while trying to help someone in distress. This occurred during a gathering of approximately fifty thousand people following the January 7th killing of Renee Good, at an event called “ICE Out of Minnesota: Day of Truth and Freedom,” organized by community leaders, clergy of many faiths, and labor unions. Leaders from across the Reform Movement traveled to Minnesota to stand alongside the community, to offer solidarity, and to bear witness in person. Presence matters. Refusing to look away matters.

Our hearts ache for what is taking place in our country. A nation fractured by fear. A people struggling to recognize one another as neighbors rather than threats. Bearing witness to this reality is painful, but refusing to see it would be far more dangerous.

This same week brought another kind of sorrow. On Monday, January 26, the remains of Master Sergeant Ran Gvili, z”l, age 24 were finally returned to Israel. Ran was the last remaining hostage in Gaza after being abducted by Hamas on October 7 and murdered. At last, his family was able to lay him to rest. For the first time since 2014, no Israeli hostages remain in Gaza. Yet this moment brings neither relief nor closure. It brings sorrow layered upon sorrow. Every hostage was a whole world. Every family now carries a future forever altered by violence.

We send our deepest condolences to Ran Gvili’s family and to all the families of the hostages. May they, and all who mourn, be surrounded by compassion. May they find strength, healing, and the possibility of life beyond trauma. May all who dwell in the land of Israel, and all who long for peace, come to know safety, dignity, and security in the days ahead.

On Tuesday, January 27, we observed International Holocaust Remembrance Day. A day that demands memory, not only of the six million Jews who were murdered, but of the moral cost of silence, denial, and indifference. Holocaust remembrance is itself an act of bearing witness across generations. It reminds us what happens when hatred is normalized and when the world stands idly by.

So much heaviness to hold in a single week, layered atop the personal burdens many among us are already carrying.

Judaism teaches us that it is not enough to wring our hands and say, “Woe is me, how terrible.” “Lo ta’amod al dam re’echa.” We cannot stand idly by. Each of us must take action, even when it feels overwhelming.

Where do we begin?

Some of us will volunteer our time, offering our hands and hearts where they are most needed. Some will write or call our members of Congress, using our voices to advocate for policies rooted in dignity and justice. Some will make donations to organizations that are doing the difficult work of protecting the vulnerable and effecting change. Some will show up, again and again, for neighbors who are afraid, hurting, or marginalized. Action takes many forms. All of them matter.

The Buddhist monks embarked on their Walk for Peace. Others traveled to Minnesota to stand shoulder to shoulder with a community in pain, offering presence, support, and solidarity, and bearing witness in person. Not all of us can do these things. That does not diminish our responsibility. It clarifies it. Each of us must find the action that is ours to take.

This week, Zemer Lexie Nuell, our TBO Director of Music and Community, also felt the weight of what we have been witnessing. She saw the monks on their Walk for Peace and followed the events in Minnesota. She wondered how she would one day explain this moment in history to her children. She wrote, “It’s easy to feel beaten down or helpless watching the news right now. I know there is power and comfort that comes from singing together… I texted about this with another TBO member and knew if she and I felt like that, probably others did as well.” Her response was to act. Within two days, she organized an evening of “Songs of Peace and Protest,” even composing a new original piece for the gathering. With little notice, people came. They needed to be together. They needed to sing, to hold one another, and to remember they were not alone. The evening met the moment with grace, poignancy, uplift, and most of all bonds of unity and community.

Her response is music. Mine is words.

As an intentional interim rabbi, it is not my habit to regularly comment on political matters. But these are not ordinary times. If I do not speak up, I would not be living up to my Jewish obligation of “lo ta’amod al dam re’echa,” the very obligation my father taught me to take seriously. With my words, I hope to inspire, motivate, or encourage others to speak up, volunteer, contact elected officials, support organizations doing good work, and take meaningful action in whatever ways they are able. It does not have to be on these particular issues. It can be for any issue that matters deeply to you.

Judaism teaches that disagreement is not a failure. It is part of sacred community. We can disagree, sometimes passionately, as long as we do so with civility and kindness, and as long as we continue to sit together as one community.

This week’s Torah portion (B’shalach from the Book of Exodus) includes Shirat HaYam, the Song of the Sea. After the Israelites cross to freedom, the Egyptian army drowns behind them. The rabbis imagine the angels rejoicing, only to be silenced by God, who says, “How can you rejoice when My people are drowning?” This is why, at Passover, we remove ten drops of wine from our cups. Even our joy must be tempered by the suffering of others.

We are all God’s children. Even those with whom we profoundly disagree.

If God grieves, if God cries, when enemies perish, how much more must we grieve when innocent people are persecuted, targeted, or killed. How much more must we refuse a world in which fear determines who may safely work, worship, or walk freely.

The monks remind us that peace begins with compassion. Torah reminds us that compassion must lead to action. Bearing witness demands both.

We pray for a world where God no longer cries nor grieves over what is taking place because we have figured out how to live with one another in compassion, kindness, harmony, justice, and peace.

“Then all shall sit under their vine and fig tree, and none shall make them afraid.” (Micah 4:4).

If Not Now (by Carrie Newcomer)

Shabbat Shalom!