Sermon for Rosh Hashanah Eve 5779 1 9 September 2018: Creating Connections in the New Year Morris calls his son in New York and says, Benny, I have something I need to tell you. However, I don t want to discuss it. You re my oldest child, and I thought you ought to know. I ve made up my mind, I m divorcing your mother. The son is shocked and asks his father to tell him what happened. I don t want to get into it. My mind is made up. But Dad, you can t decide to divorce Mom just like that after 54 years together. What happened? Morris replied: It s too painful to talk about it. You can call your sister and tell her. It will spare me the pain. But where s Mom? Can I talk to her? No, I don t want you to say anything to her about it. I haven t told her yet. Believe me, it hasn t been easy. I ve finally come to a decision. I have an appointment with my lawyer the day after tomorrow. Dad, please don t do anything rash. I m going to take the first flight to Chicago. Promise me that you won t do anything until I get there. Well all right, I promise. Next week is Passover. I ll hold off seeing the lawyer until after the Seder. Call your sister in New Jersey and break the news to her. I just can t bear to talk about it anymore.
Half an hour later, Morris receives a call from his daughter who tells him that she and her brother were able to get tickets and that they and the children will be arriving at O Hare the day after tomorrow. Benny told me that you don t want to talk about it on the phone, but promise me that you won t do anything until we both get there, Morris promises. After hanging up from his daughter, Morris turns to his wife and says, Well, it worked this time, they re coming for the Seder, but we are going to have to come up with a new idea to get them here for Rosh Hashanah. [PAUSE] Precious! What would we do without our relationships? Relationships are everything: We cannot live with them, we cannot live without them! A study from Harvard University shows that there is one key indicator for happier and healthier lives. According to the research, our ticket to a good life is relationships; they keep us happier and healthier. The study concludes that The people who fared the best were the people who leaned into relationships with family, with friends, and with community. Life is all about relationships. Most of us would say that we want a life filled with good relationships, but how often are we willing to spend the time and effort, it would take to develop and nurture them? Many us may say one thing and do another. Rosh Hashanah invites us to think about our relationships and focus on how intentional we have been in 5778 about creating and maintaining them. I want us to think about how much time and effort we have spent developing and 2
strengthening three basic connections, aiming at how we can do better in the year ahead. 3 My vision for our congregation is centered around building relationships. As we move forward together I pray that each individual, old and young, will develop and strengthen their connection to the Jewish experience, to Beth Torah s clergy and professional staff and, above all, to one another. Let s think about the first relationship: Our connection to the Jewish experience. How did we do in the past year? How big an effort did we make to incorporate Judaism into our lives? The Hebrew word we use to describe our shortcomings is chet, as in the Yom Kippur confessions, Al chet shechatanu lefanechah, which is often understood as missing the mark. So, have we missed the mark in developing and nurturing our connections to the Jewish experience? In case you are wondering, I do not mean attending services, although that counts, and we d love to see you. But I mean, when you think about your priority list, where do Judaism and the Jewish experiences that we have available here at Beth Torah, fit? I invite each of you to ponder these questions and answer them in earnest as we begin to think about how we can do better in 5779. Good news! You are here and therefore you are making a connection right now! You may feel a connection through our music, our singing, our English prayers, our Hebrew liturgy, or our beautiful sanctuary, where you have chosen
to welcome the New Year. It is a great beginning, but it is only the beginning: it will take effort for each of us to keep this connection going. One thing great thing about Judaism is that we have many ways to connect, even when we are not in shul ; we can connect through the way we live our lives, how we eat, how we act, how we treat each other, how we help others in the wider community: All possible ways of connecting to the Jewish experience. But why work so hard on building relationships with a person, to a community? They seem to have no concrete and tangible effect on us. We spend a lot of time and money on material THINGS, on things we can see and touch, but we tend to spend significantly less on connecting. There are many things in life that cannot be seen, yet there is evidence of their existence. In her book Let s Talk about God, Dorothy Kripke teaches: We cannot see God we cannot see many things. We cannot see the wind. But we see autumn leaves flying and dancing, all orange and gold. [...] Then we know the wind is there. We see what the wind does, even though we cannot see the wind itself. We cannot see love, but we know when someone loves us. We feel love in a hug or a smile or a friendly look or a warm touch. We feel love in many ways, but we never see love. We know it by what it does to us. [..] Relationships are like that, we cannot see them but we can feel their effects in our lives; at the same time, we can sense their absence. In his commentary of the Rosh Hashanah machzor, Rabbi Jonathan Sacks teaches, The placing of 4
Rosh Hashanah before Yom Kippur means that our determination to act better in the future is prior to our feelings of remorse about the past. (p. xxviii). The sound of the shofar should turn our attention to how we improve our connection to the Jewish experience in the year ahead. Tonight, we may take the first step, but the future is open and we should not dwell on the past, except to teach us how we can do better. Let us make a concerted effort to develop and nurture whichever connections we find meaningful and relevant; let us seek them out and embrace them. The Jewish experience is vast and open and worth the effort. It is our responsibility to build our personal relationship with facets of the Jewish experience. Our connection to the Jewish experience will lead us to more relationships with people in Jewish leadership positions and with other fellow seekers. Dr. Ron Wolfson, who will be our scholar-in-residence during Hanukkah, teaches that developing true connections with the Jewish experience is about creating lifelong relationships that can develop within communities and that will lift us up and beyond our own individualism. Relationships based on listening to one another s needs and on shared experience, and through commitments to work side by side and to join together in prayer. Relationships that require face-to-face encounters. Our connection to Judaism may begin as a personal search, but it must lead to a connection with others, including a rabbi [pause]. For many of you, the most valued relationship you have had with Beth Torah is that connection you once 5
made with our Founding Rabbi, Mark Levin. In the last two years, I have heard again and again Rabbi Levin married us, Rabbi Levin did my confirmation, Rabbi Levin did my bris! Well not quite... but it is clear to me that for some of you, your connection with the Jewish experience had a great deal to do with your relationship with Rabbi Levin. My situation, in contrast, is different. There might be 30 or 40 individuals, many of them here tonight, who have had a chance to meet with me face-to-face. Maybe you serve on the board of one of our committees, maybe you volunteer or attend services or classes regularly, or perhaps we have interacted as part of a lifecycle event, or maybe you are a bit pushier and got on my schedule before anyone else did... I m glad we have had the opportunity to meet and learn something about each other. Already, you have made a connection with me and I hope you value it as much as I do. This year, I would like to expand my circle of connections and give that same opportunity to more of you. We can wait until a life-cycle event or life crisis hits, but why wait? I want to take our relationship to the next level: I have a proposal for the New Year; a proposal I hope you ll embrace. Would you do me the great honor of having coffee with me? My goal: 100 coffees from Sukkot to Shavu ot! Just not everyone at once, but one-on-one. 5779 will be the year of the coffee -by the way, you can have tea or whatever you want when we meet. But you get the idea: I want to meet you face-to-face, 6
one-on-one, so I can hear your story and listen -I may do some talking too, it is inevitable. There will be no ask of any kind, just you and I over coffee. Here s how it will work out: I hope you have all received your name tags, and wear them proudly. As you walk out this evening, you will get a chance to say yes to my proposal. All you have to do is to place an ORANGE dot on the back of your name tag before you return it to the box provided. We will do the rest. You will be contacted after High Holy Days letting you know how and when you can sign up for the actual time and day when we will meet for coffee. So, all you have to do tonight is say yes with the ORANGE dot. So, this year, making a personal connection to the Jewish experience and meeting for coffee with the rabbi could be two great ways of moving in the direction of creating a closer relationship with Judaism. As deeply engaged with your own Jewish practice as you might be; as well-acquainted as you can be with me or the members of our professional team, you are still missing one fundamental piece: How are you part of a community? Do you feel that you might be missing that piece or that those relationships in your life are broken and need mending in the year ahead? In the Torah we are taught, You shall love your neighbor as yourself, and You shall love Adonai your God. In both cases, we are commanded to love. How is that possible? How can we be ordered to love one another and to love God? Many scholars suggest that the love the Torah is talking about is not romantic love; it is not about a feeling but an action : To honor and 7
obey the covenant. Ahavah is everything we to do build up and sustain the relationship we have with God and with other people. 8 In his book, Relational Judaism: Using the Power of Relationships to Transform the Jewish Community, Ron Wolfson writes: In the end, the purpose of Judaism the purpose of relationships is to love the other [both God and neighbor]. When you do, you find meaning an understanding of the significance of life; you find purpose an imperative to do what you are put on earth to do during your life; you find belonging a community of people who will be there for you and with you; and you find blessing a feeling of deep satisfaction and gratitude, [...] It is all about relationships and creating and deepening them is the challenge to our Jewish communal institutions. Beth Torah is already meeting the challenge. As part of our 30th-anniversary celebrations, last May, we launched our Pick A Party initiative. 30 gatherings with friends, old and new. There is something for everyone and all the information is on our webpage. The feedback from those who already attended one has been positive. They were able to meet new people and CONNECT with other Beth Torah members. This year, we will do more relational events like these. In the next few months, when you come to Beth Torah, you will be given opportunities to connect and relate to fellow congregants. We will try different things, at different times, for different groups. We will stay focused on
achieving the goal that each individual will develop a connection with the Jewish experience, with me and our professional staff, and with each other. 9 Remember, relationships take time and effort. If you attend something, and it does not work for you, let us know. Think about the relationships you already have in your life: your spouse, partner, best friend, best neighbor. I would be surprised to learn that in each case it happened the first time you ever tried. We at Beth Torah want to make easier for you; we have given you name tags. Are wearing them? This evening after you have kissed and wished your family and close friends l shanah tovah, take a moment to wish someone you do not know a happy New Year. If you feel adventurous, maybe you d ask them how long they ve been a member; and if you feel like pushing it, maybe what prompted to come to services tonight And tomorrow, after services, we will have another opportunity to interact as we share the first ever Rosh Hashanah luncheon here at Beth Torah. Wear your name tags tomorrow too, please. The staff and lay-leadership at our congregation want to connect with you not only when you are in our building. This year, members of the Board were asked to call our families before the New Year to wish you l shanah tovah. It is both a way of saying thank you for being our member and an opportunity to listen to you. We want to hear your story, your concerns, and your hopes. I know that our board members enjoyed making the calls, and I hope that you received the calls in the way we meant them to be: an opportunity to make a connection.
All of us on staff and lay-leadership are making a conscious effort to be more relational in all we do; to listen and to invite each one of you to co-create the future of our congregation. Ultimately, it is your choice to open up to connections. To me, is is an essential teaching of Judaism: What makes us human is our ability to make choices. We make a choice when we decide to be part of a Jewish experience, just like each of you has chosen to spend this evening with us. I could say, Thank you for choosing Beth Torah for your Rosh Hashanah experience, but perhaps... you should thank yourself because marking the beginning of the Jewish New Year with your community is in itself a reward, a way that you reward your spirit and your Jewish identity. The Kotzker Rebbe, a great Hasidic master of the nineteenth century, was once asked by his students, Where is God? The Rebbe s famous answer was God is wherever we let God in. Rabbi Harold Schulweis changes the question. He advises, Don t ask: Where is God? Ask: When is God? God is to be found in the between, when human beings encounter each other when we are in relationship. As we celebrate the beginning of a New Year, here in community, I wish you a year of connections and renewed relationships with what you value in your Judaism, in our congregations, and in each other. May those connections bring blessings into our lives, v cho nitvarech, and thus we will be blessed. May we merit these blessings and may they come to be. May it be so. L shanah tovah! 10