Breaking False Dichotomies, Compassion and Empathy, Grief & Coping, Historic Profiles, Hold Dualities Together, Longform, Longform, This Week In Wisdom, Uncategorized, Wisdom Daily News / 22 Jan 2021

Night Words, A Midrash For The Holocaust

The Meaning of this Day, January 27, 2021 In 2005, the United Nations General Assembly designated January 27–the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau–as International Holocaust Remembrance Day. On this annual day of commemoration, the UN urges the world community to honor the six million Jewish victims of the Holocaust and millions of other victims of Nazism. The theme guiding Holocaust remembrance in 2021 is Facing the Aftermath: Recovery and Reconstitution After The Holocaust. The never-ending process of recovery and reconstitution of individuals, communities, and systems of justice includes: accurately recording the history of the Holocaust, challenging the denial and distortion of historical events, cultivating historical literacy about the Holocaust, developing new legal safeguards to protect against any future genocides, recording the testimony of victims of the Holocaust, and addressing the needs of the survivors. A critical step in Recovery and Reconstitution After The Holocaust is developing communal rituals and practices that help us digest the indigestible and nurture some spark of hope in the face of the abyss of the Holocaust. To this end, literary scholar and cultural historian Dr. David Roskies’ powerful, provocative, exquisite liturgy Night Words is a sacred and breathtaking contribution. As Professor Roskies illuminates, “In the beginning was the Holocaust. We must therefore begin again.” This is true whatever our ideologies, politics, nationalities, and tribes. Night Words was originally created in 1971 and has had four editions. It does what all great rituals do – “dosages” the too muchness of Reality so that we can metabolize the unimaginable and then, just maybe, wander this world together with a touch more humanity. Clal – The National Jewish Center for Learning and Leadership is honored to re-release Night Words. Against a global context of rising antisemitism and increasing levels of disinformation, hate speech and dangerous demonization of…

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Another Way Of Looking At Things, Bring The Sacred Down To Earth, Compassion and Empathy, Longform, Longform, News & Politics, Soul Writings, This Week In Wisdom, Uncategorized / 20 Jan 2021

Modeh Ani: My Blessing for a New Day

Personal Thanks to G*d

Inspiring People / 18 Jan 2021

Where Is Dr. King?

The attention around Martin Luther King Jr. Weekend seems muted.

Breaking False Dichotomies, Compassion and Empathy, Hold Dualities Together, Longform, Longform, Uncategorized / 14 Jan 2021

Now What?

Donald Trump is mentally ill and needs a constitutional straitjacket. He is hungry for adulation to compensate for a mind-blowing inner lack of self-worth -that even those of us most horrified by his venality have to feel a smidgeon of compassion for. His most violent followers – a minority of the 70+ million people who voted for him – rendered needy, powerless, and stripped of their dignity by serious societal stress – have through their adulating Trump felt powerful. The violence of last Wednesday and the violence of Trump’s administration is a toxic compensation for his feelings of inadequacy and for the feelings of the minority of his supporters ready to use violence. And of course, Trump’s speech last night, calling for no more violence and proclaiming that no true supporter of his would threaten fellow Americans is exactly the opposite of what he feels and believes. Trump traffics in political violence. It is oxygen for his sense of self and It is precisely his truest supporters who are the most violent. And the relationship between him and these supporters, which makes both sides feel “whole”, is pathological — at a research-worthy level. And of course, there was no self -reflection or accountability in his speech or any recognition that his words -even if “misunderstood” – may have in some way incited the mob behavior that killed six people. There couldn’t be because the mob literally created Trump’s feeling of self which is why he wasn’t shocked by the violence but, as reported, delighted by what he was watching on TV. Trump is an evil Chauncey Gardiner. Donald Trump is not capable of self-reflection. One can only imagine the pressure he felt and the damage he realized to his self-interest –his “brand” – that made him give last night’s speech….

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Breaking False Dichotomies, Hold Dualities Together, Longform, News & Politics, This Week In Wisdom, Uncategorized, Wisdom Daily News / 13 Jan 2021

Reckoning or Reconciliation?  How About Both?

To impeach or not to impeach. That is the question. Or is it? Perhaps the more important question at this moment is not a question of what to do, but of why we do it. That has certainly been my approach, as I am asked if there are any spiritual or religious responses to the cresting chorus of those who are ready to explain the “right answer” to the question of impeachment — Focusing on the “why” more than the “what.” The question of whether or not the President should be impeached, or “25’ed,” is often framed as a question of reckoning vs reconciliation — of punishing bad acts or paving a shared path forward. Since no culture can last long without some combination of justice and mercy, the question of reckoning vs reconciliation is a false dichotomy, and we need to back up and consider not which is the right response, but why any of us is advocating for whichever one we choose, and only then reconsider our initial response to the question of what we should do. Thinking about the “why” can lead us to a better”what,” whatever it ends up being. I am inspired by one of the peak liturgical moments on both Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, but this is not a sermon. I am inspired by these days precisely because, taken together as a package deal, as they typically are by most people, they are days of reckoning and reconciliation, with Rosh Hashanah being more about the former, and Yom Kippur being more about the latter, reminding us that we all need at least some measure of both. So how might we go about getting some of both in this fraught and still deeply polarized moment, regardless of the answer to the impeachment question for…

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