Weekly Reflections - Houston Congregation for Reform Judaism

June 13, 2018

Dear Friends,

In the 8th century BCE, the Prophet Isaiah espoused the following words which remain a primary call for peace in the world today:

Let us go up to the mountain of the Lord [where]. . . God shall judge among the nations, and shall rebuke many people: and they shall beat their swords into ploughshares, and their spears into pruning hooks: nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore.—Isaiah 2:3–4

Isaiah’s words are words of hope that tools used for the sole purpose of destruction might one day be transformed into tools to help feed the world and serve human kind in a positive way. While nothing prophetic may have come out of the summit in Singapore, echoes of Isaiah were certainly present.

As it is with all efforts towards peace, we must proceed with extreme caution, but we must proceed nonetheless. The denuclearization of our world today has far more profound implications for the future of humanity than spears and pruning hooks did in the 8th century BCE. Therefore, as we reflect on the meeting between President Trump and Kim Jong Un (even if the details of any agreement are yet to be articulated), it must be seen in light of Isaiah’s vision of a world liberated from the shackles of human destruction.

L’Shalom-Steve

June 6, 2018

Dear Friends,

In our Torah portion this week, we are presented with two biblical characters who represent archetypes of moral courage. Joshua and Caleb are two spies among a company of twelve who have the faith and the inner strength to stand up and speak out with a minority opinion.

As our Torah recounts, twelve messengers are sent by Moses to scout out the Land of Israel. All but Joshua and Caleb report the following, “The country that we traversed and scouted is one that devours its settlers. All the people that we saw in it are men of great size–and we looked like grasshoppers to ourselves, and so we must have looked to them” (Numbers 13:32).

In contrast to the ten naysayers, Joshua & Caleb return with messages of hope for the future. They say, “Let us by all means go up, and we shall gain possession of [the land], for we shall surely overcome [our adversaries]” (Numbers 13:30).

The juxtaposition of these two reports is as familiar to us today as it was in ancient times. In most situations where major decisions must be made, there is usually a majority and a minority report. The fact that the Torah celebrates the minority report through Joshua and Caleb invites us to consider moments in time when we too are challenged to defend a minority point of view.

In our world today, there are many moral causes which can seem far too gigantic for us to confront. Does this mean we should shy away? Absolutely not. We need to have the faith and moral grounding of Joshua and Caleb, and try (in whatever ways we can) to confront these giants head on.

L’Shalom-Steve

The Thought behind Thanks and the Birth of Generosity

Sometimes the etymology of words can reveal tremendous depth and meaning. Such is the case when we examine the deeper meaning behind the commonly used expression, “Thanks for your generosity.”

The word thank is related phonetically to think just as the word song is related to sing. This etymological insight helps us to understand that feelings of gratitude have long been linked to human thought. When we receive a gift from someone, we tend to think of them in an elevated way, and this cognitive shift is directly imbedded in the way in which we express gratitude. When we say, “Thank you,” we are essentially saying, “This gift makes me think of you.”

The origins of the word generosity are insightful as well. Rooted in the Latin word for “of noble birth,” expressions of generosity emerge from an honorable place in the human soul. Thus, when we say, “Thank you for your generosity,” we are essentially saying, “This noble offering from the depths of your soul makes me think of you.”

In April, each member of our congregation received a letter expressing a financial shortfall for this fiscal year. The letter explained that due to a number of factors our expenses were likely going to exceed our revenue. This letter also made a plea for financial assistance in addressing this budgetary challenge, and our membership rose to the occasion.

It is with tremendous gratitude and joy that we can report that through acts of your generosity (gifts from your soul), the financial concerns have been alleviated. Thank you!

As we consider the response to this letter, it is important to know that the generous support was not from just a few people — we had 40 gifts and 13 increases in dues. These numbers are significant. They demonstrate that the health and future of a community is a collective endeavor.

Our sages taught, “Kol Yisrael Arevim Zeh Ba’Zeh – The entire community of Israel is responsible for one another.” This statement stresses the idea that Jews in general and our congregational family in particular share a common destiny, and we need each other to achieve it. Your responses to the pleas of our community are a profound demonstration of this long standing Jewish value.

Indeed, whenever we gather to worship, celebrate, learn, mourn and serve, we take these ancient words to heart. We are all in this together. We are all responsible for our collective destiny. We share a responsibility to the youngest through the oldest members of our community, and like a big family, we seek to provide for the present as we ensure stability for the future. For all this and so much more, “Thank you for your generosity.”

May 30, 2018

Dear Friends,

Today, I had the unique and sacred responsibility of bringing a pair of newborn twin girls into the covenant of Israel. It was a truly joyous moment, but as I engaged in this ancient ritual at the mikvah, I paused in a moment of existential bewilderment.

In what way was my role in this confluence of relationships “making” these two baby girls Jewish?

Before I answer my own question, allow me to share the circumstances. These two beautiful babies were born here in Houston to a non-Jewish surrogate mother. The parents, who are two gay men from Israel, requested my services so that these two babies would be “officially” Jewish before they returned to Israel to be raised in a Jewish household.

On so many levels, these two babies were already 100% Jewish. Even though the womb from which they emerged was not of a Jewish mother, everything from the point of their births forward would be Jewish. Their fathers were Jewish. They were going to live in Israel. They would speak Hebrew. They would know all the blessings. Nothing in their lives was anything but Jewish, and yet, in the minds of these two fathers, immersion in the mikvah with a rabbi was a necessary step.

Why? The answer is that this ritual was for the fathers, not for the babies.

Sometimes we do rituals to remind ourselves of our commitments to our faith. In this case, immersing their newborn daughters in the mikvah was a means to affirm who the fathers were and what they believed.

So too it is with all of us. Rituals serve many purposes in our lives. They help us mark sacred occasions; they enable us to connect to our faith; they bond us together as a community; and YES, they even make us Jewish!

L’Shalom-Steve

May 23, 2018

Dear Friends,

The school shooting in Santa Fe this past week has brought the realities of a tragic and terrifying national issue to our doorstep. While there may be policies which need to be debated and cultural practices that need to be addressed, now is the time to come together as a community.

This weekend, congregations of all denominations and faiths are standing in solidarity with the people of Santa Fe. Churches, temples, mosques and synagogues throughout the city of Houston will be participating in a very special program sponsored by Gallery Furniture and Interfaith Ministries called, “Banners for Santa Fe”.

For this massive interfaith effort, Gallery Furniture has created huge, high quality banners (10 feet by 10 feet) which will be the templates for our thoughts, prayers and expressions of compassion, encouragement and hope. These banners will be shared with the Santa Fe community at appropriate times over the next several months.

Join us on Friday night to participate in this service of solidarity.

These supportive efforts are only a beginning as we seek to extend love and support to a community in need of healing. As we venture forward, our hope is to generate a multi-faith environment of collaboration and cooperation which can soon openly and honestly address issues surrounding gun violence, public safety and mental health issues in America today.

L’Shalom-Steve

May 16, 2018

Dear Friends,

This weekend, Jews around the world will be celebrating the Festival of Shavuot, which is also known as the Festival of the Giving of the Torah. According to the Torah, it took precisely 49 days, or seven weeks, for the ancient Israelites to travel from Egypt to the foot of Mount Sinai. Our celebration each year follows the Torah’s commandment: “And you shall proclaim that day (the 50th day) to be a holy convocation!” (Leviticus 23:21).The name Shavuot, “Weeks”, symbolizes the completion of this seven-week journey.

Among the many observances associated with this holiday is the ceremony of Confirmation. Through this beautiful service, the community comes together to celebrate the transmission of Torah to the next generation as our high school students publically affirm their faith and their commitments to our heritage.

Please join us this Friday night, May 18, as each of our confirmation students embrace the scroll and receive a personal blessing in front of the ark. Through this powerful ritual, our entire community dramatically re-enacts the receiving of Torah in a very special way.

In the spirit of Shavuot, I encourage all of us to set aside some sacred time for Torah. We might explore a Jewish concept on the internet, read a passage from the Bible or even take a walk outside and find inspiration through God’s works of creation. Some congregations in Houston offer Torah study sessions called Leil Tikun Shavuot. These all night sessions will begin Saturday evening and continue through sun rise. They are open all who may be interested, so you might consider attending a night of learning.

Whatever path you might choose to take, spend some time this weekend considering the glorious truths that are reveled to us every day. Spend time with family; spend time in nature; and most of all, spend time considering your place in the ever-unfolding story of our faith and heritage.

L’Shalom-Steve

May 9, 2018

Dear Friends,

We just concluded a portion of the Torah which permits an early glimpse of how the Bible attempts to shape the sacred nature of our lives by setting celebrations and events along the course of a calendar year. In this Torah portion, we are presented with a very rudimentary version of the Jewish calendar we use today. This simplified calendar includes: the weekly Sabbath, Rosh HaShanah, Yom Kippur, and the three Harvest Festivals (Passover, Shavuot, Sukkot).

It is interesting to note that each sacred observance involves some kind of sacrifice. On the Sabbath, we sacrifice work. During the festivals, we sacrifice the harvest and on Yom Kippur, we sacrifice consumption of any kind. These sacrifices help make time sacred and holy. They bond us as a people and enable us to express our appreciation for all we have.

This Sunday is Mother’s Day, and while it may not be in the Bible, the day is sacred to mothers, fathers and children alike. It is a day set aside to express our gratitude for the daily sacrifices of our mothers and a way for us to elevate the sacred nature of motherhood.

Happy Mother’s Day to all moms. May this be a day filled with the blessings of love, joy and gratitude.

L’Shalom-Steve

May 2, 2018

Dear Friends,

Tomorrow is Lag BaOmer, a holiday marking the 33rd day of the Counting of the Omer. This relatively obscure observance in Reform Jewish circles is a fun-filled day in the middle of a ritual period of counting called “The Counting of the Omer”. This ancient custom is based on the commandment:

“From the day after the Sabbath, the day that you bring the sheaf of wave-offing, you shall count off 7 full weeks.” Leviticus 23:15

This biblical mandate to “count the Omer” implores us to count our days for seven weeks from Passover to Shavuot. For generations, these days of counting have come to represent ways of counting our blessings.

This week we will be counting our blessings as a congregation in two very special ways. Please join us for each of these events:

Teacher Appreciation Shabbat: Friday night, May 4:

This Friday night, we will be honoring our teachers with a special Shabbat service. Please join us for a wonderful fajita dinner followed by a celebration of our teachers as we express our gratitude for all they do.

Pancake Breakfast and Annual Meeting: Sunday, May 6:

This coming Sunday, we will gather to set our sights on next year. Please join us as we look back on the blessings of the past year and plan for many more blessing in the year to come. We need your voice and your input.

WHAT        HCRJ Annual Meeting
WHEN        Sunday morning, May 6
TIME           9:00 am – 10:00 am – Pancake Breakfast and Registration
10:00 am – Meeting

On this Lag BaOmer, let us consider the blessings that fill our lives with meaning and value. May this day of counting help us remember to count our days and enjoy them to their fullest.

L’Shalom-Steve

A Tale of Two Mitzvahs

At the end of every Jewish worship service, our concluding prayers include the Adoration or Aleinu, which contains a powerful statement regarding the human partnership with God in the establishment of a perfect world to come. This messianic hope states that it is our responsibility to “perfect the world under the sovereignty of God.” In Hebrew, the phrase “to perfect the world” is “tikkun olam.”

While there may be many ways to interpret this eternal mission and many pathways to its realization, this article entitled, A Tale of Two Mitzvahs, will focus on two specific commandments and two remarkable members of our congregation who have employed them to perfect the world in which we live. Each of these commandments is part of the Holiness Codes which are read from the Torah on Yom Kippur afternoon. They come from the Book of Leviticus and shape our understanding of morality.

You shall not insult the deaf nor place a stumbling block before the blind. (Lev. 19:14)

You shall not stand idly by the blood of your neighbor. (Lev. 19:16)

The ethics embodied by the first of these commandments helps define human decency. The second of these commandments demands accountability. Both constitute the framework for my Tale of Two Mitzvahs.

When Mort Fefer started recording books for the blind, he did so because it combined his deep love of math and science, his innate passion for teaching and his boundless desire to help others. In his heart, he knew that blindness should not be an impediment to learning mathematics and chemistry. So he took it upon himself to remove that stumbling block by recording audio versions of math and chemistry books for blind students.

Mort’s work was more than a labor of love. It was a mitzvah. Try to imagine how complicated it would be to describe the abstract concepts found in Geometry, Calculus or Chemistry without the use of visuals. How does one describe a shape to someone who has never seen a circle or a triangle? Yet, this is exactly what Mort did, and in doing so, he took to heart the Torah’s commandment regarding placing a stumbling block before the blind.

Whenever we proactively involve ourselves in repairing the world (tikun olam), we embrace the spirit of the second commandment mentioned above as well, for whenever we actively address an injustice, we make a conscious decision to “not stand idly by.” In Judaism, a bystander has a moral obligation to rescue someone who is in peril. This religious obligation has parameters, but it is understood to be an ethical and legal responsibility to extend ourselves, in whatever way we can, when a fellow human is in danger.

For years, Joel Androphy (a prominent Houston defense attorney) witnessed countless court cases where inadequate legal representation led to overly harsh and often unfair punishments to African American men who could not afford to pay for decent legal counsel. On Yom Kippur afternoon in 2016, Joel had an epiphany. During the afternoon service, Pastor Harvey Clemons Jr (a Baptist minister in Houston’s Fifth Ward) delivered a profoundly moving sermon on the Prophet Isaiah. In it, Pastor Clemons challenged our community to find ways to move the prayers of our hearts into positive transformation in the world.

Upon hearing the Pastor’s plea, Joel refused to stand on the sidelines. He could not stand idly by while economic injustices were unfolding around him, so he immediately set up a program in conjunction with Pastor Clemons to provide top quality, pro bono legal services to young men who needed it. This program came with one stipulation for those men who chose to work with Joel. This stipulation required these young men to give their time and energy to the church in exchange for legal counsel. In just two years, the program had become so successful that it was awarded the 2018 Harris County Bench Bar Pro Bono Award by the Houston Bar Association and the Harris County judiciary.

The commandments against “standing idly by” and “placing a stumbling block before the blind” might be considered to be among Judaism’s most important directives for human decency in the world. Each definitively states that it is an admonition to take advantage of others and calls upon us to take action demanding that society and people do everything possible to help the weak, the vulnerable and the helpless. May we find guidance in these commandments and inspiration from Mort and Joel who help us see how to translate them into our lives.

April 25, 2018

Dear Friends,

What a glorious week it has been! Houston weather can be rather temperamental, but this is one of those weeks that invites us to embrace the beauty and grandeur of nature. Spring is in the air (as all of our allergies are telling us), and the world of creation is singing a song of glory. In some ways, it is as if nature is telling us to count our blessings or take an inventory of the goodness that surrounds us.

This kind of spring inventory is a long standing Jewish tradition as Jews around the world are currently observing a sacred period called, “the Counting of the Omer.” This observance is based on the biblical mandate to count bundles of grain (the omer) every day for 7 weeks from the second day of Passover through the festival of Shavuot.

Today, this ritual counting has more to do with cultivating the human spirit than it does with cultivating the land. One modern interpretation of the Counting of the Omer suggests that this ancient ritual encourages us to count our blessings and make each and every day of our lives count.

If you have already done so this week, take a walk or sip a cup of coffee outside. We all know that this gorgeous weather will soon give way to ceaseless heat and humidity. Let us find a little time to take it all in, and as we do, we need to be counting our blessings every day.

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