I have now given 8 Yom Kippur remarks from the Bimah, 4 by myself and 4 shared with Allison. So, I struggled, trying to figure out what was important enough for me to say this morning. I’ve gone through every appropriate joke I know, and the lights and the electricity are still on. Although very tempting, I still decided to not take Danny’s advice that when in doubt, try scotch. I lost a fair amount of my records when I accidently spilled a cup of hot coffee on my former laptop so I could not just read a speech I gave in 2007 or 2008 or beyond, even though Gary Bergman sent some to me. So, I thought that I would share some of my experiences and what has caused me to think that in a heartbeat I would do this all over again, only better.
I have given so much thought in my sleepless nights about the idea of civility and how Jews treat other Jews. I have also thought about what kind of leadership you want from Marty and myself. I have spent some time during the month of Elul reflecting on the concepts of forgiveness and civility. And while I don’t always practice those ideas, I am trying to get closer.
I remember an incident that I spoke about maybe 15 years ago. When my daughter Molly who is now 37, was maybe 4 or 5, she got angry with me about something I had done or not done. I don’t remember the issue, but I do remember that she told me “You should go back to pre-school and learn how to be nice to people.” I laugh about it now but at the time she was quite serious, and it gave me pause about myself, who I am as a person, and how I treat others. Even though I never made it back to pre-school, I have given a lot of thought about the concept that she meant.
I attended the Aufruf for Jesse Nagleberg at the shul his grandparents belong to, Oheb Shalom. The rabbi’s remarks that morning of Labor Day weekend really struck a chord with me and I asked her if she would share what she said. Since I teach a course on Ethics, some of what I am about to say, came from her sermon. While I am very far from a Rabbinic scholar, I do want to start with a quote from The Parsha Re’eh Chapter 11 V 26…that starts “Behold, I set before you this day a blessing and a curse.” While it had to do with whether you follow G-d’s commandments or not, I thought about it in a different way.
What do you see? A blessing, or curse? Are you pessimistic or optimistic, is the glass half-empty or half-full? Are you someone prone to seeing just the evil in the world, or its goodness? Both are here. That’s this opening line: I set before you a blessing and a curse. See them both, they are both always here, often side by side.
What do you see? What assumptions do we make about what we see? How do we hold the blessings and curses set before us in terms of how we see the world? Studies have been done about eye contact – the way we look at, see, one another, into one another’s eyes/souls – and studies show that we spend the most time looking into one another’s eyes at the beginning of relationships. I have been married for 51 years and I rarely look into my husband’s beautiful blue eyes. Over time though we look less and less at one another, into one another’s eyes. It’s true as well of parents and children; when our children are young, we spend a lot of time looking into their eyes and as they get older – well, even making eye contact with your teenager can be tricky business! So, there is something here – in order to feel connected we need to see one another; seeing one another is part of how we love and care and know one another deeply.
During the last EC meeting, there was some disagreement about something we were discussing. No big deal, one of the joys for me is being able to talk about issues and disagree. I am truly my father’s daughter in that way. One of the members said we should do a particular thing because it was the Jewish way of doing. I was taken aback and said to this individual that I agreed with what they said but I still did not think doing this particular thing was right. I probably did not say it as nicely as I am saying it today and I went up to this person after the meeting and apologized for being rude and while this person did not think I was rude, I did not like my tone of voice and thought it was important to say so.
When I was a little girl, my father of blessed memory, used to have us go around the dinner table before we left for Kol Nidre and ask forgiveness from the other people at the table. Now I knew that my older siblings did not mean they forgave me for tattling to my mother about what they had done to me, nor that I forgave them, mostly because right after RH and YK were over, they started back on the same teasing and meanness I received as the baby. Yet, in theory it was the right thing to do. My father, who I have not shared this historical behavior for over 47 years, wanted to replicate the shtetel he was raised in where they went door to door asking for forgiveness.
To take that one step further, every year before Kol Nidre, I find three congregants and practice the same behavior. I ask for their forgiveness if I have done something that was not kind or perhaps not done something they thought I should have, especially as president, and asked for their forgiveness.
To take this another step further, when Allison Nagelberg came to CBT, I was not especially nice to her. There was just something about her that struck me the wrong way. Then one day before Kol Nidre began, I found her and asked her to forgive me for how I had treated her, and it was the beginning of a lifelong friendship and our ability to serve as co-presidents for 4 years and still be friends. She now replicates that ask just like I did to her.
So again I say..are you blessed or cursed? What do you see? Blessing, or curse? pessimism v. optimism, half-empty or half-full? Are you someone prone to seeing just the evil in the world, or its goodness?
But, let me move on to the other reason I am standing here. I am always surprised and I don’t understand when someone resigns from CBT and when asked why they resigned, they say that there was nothing here for them. When I think of the multitude of programs available and more every year, I hardly know what to say. And not only programs, but Shabbot services and minyans that, for me, provide a sense of belonging and spiritual meaning.
So as you may know, we can’t do all of those things without your help, and mine, and the donations we make today. Several years ago, a congregant told me that they thought our dues covered all the synagogue needs. I explained that it doesn’t and our donations now and throughout the year get us new HVACs when we need them as we did this past year, a new roof like we did this past year…and more. In order to balance our budget, we, all of us together, need your support, and mine. The only difference between you and me, is I am standing up here and making an ask and hope that you will respond. Every dollar helps keep the electricity on, the A/C and the heat. So please take out the envelope you were given when you walked into shul, believe in your commitment to B’nai Tikvah as one that is blessed and bend down whatever you can. There are also two other cards, one for what you might want to volunteer to do and one for a donation to our endowment. If we start by working on how we see the world; and then we do mitzvot and good things that keep us close to godliness, then we will become the good we see. See what you want to see, and then we will be what we want to see, the world will be that place of goodness, of blessing. And, may G-d find you among the blessed and seal you into the Book of Life.