On August 21st, 1995, my daughter Rachel and I were out on an errand. When we got back to the house, we were shocked to hear horrible and tragic news. Rachel’s teacher at Ezra Academy, Joan Davenny, had been the victim of a terrorist attack in Jerusalem. (more…)
I have talked on these High Holidays about holding on and letting go. I have spoken of the mistakes we make, about how we hold on to our mistakes and will not change. (more…)
Let me tell you about the sermon I was going to give today. It was about the book and movie The Perfect Storm . It was about how we often bring tragedy upon ourselves by our own actions, the way that the crew of that fishing boat The Andrea Gail did, through denial, pride, and our misplaced priority on money. I was looking forward to giving that sermon. (more…)
I used to be confused about the Christopher Columbus story. The way I had always heard it, Columbus believed that the world was round, and everyone around him believed that the world was flat. Everyone thought that Columbus was a madman; if he tried to sail to India, they said, he would sail off the edge of the earth. (more…)
For some of us, this has been a rough week in sports. Those of us who love the Yankees have watched as our team lost a playoff series to their arch-rivals, the Boston Red Sox. (more…)
Picture this terrible scene: A man has a gun, and he’s chasing a child down the street, obviously about to shoot the child at any second. You don’t know what to do. You don’t want to get involved. The man shoots the child. (more…)
I’d like to talk today about the debate that has been raging in America for the last few weeks about the radio host Don Imus and the limits of acceptable humor and speech. I’ll start with our Torah reading for this week, which lends itself perfectly to what I want to say. (more…)
This week I was in New Orleans for a few days. I was a member of a small mission of Conservative rabbis who wanted to see how we could help.Before I went, I knew what we all know, that Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans with a great impact, that the man-made protections against flooding were inadequate, that people died, that people lost their homes, that many people fled New Orleans and will never go back. I didn't really focus on the Jewish connection, on what had happened to the Jewish community of New Orleans. I didn't really think that I could help by going, but I wanted to try, in some small way, to do something. I have many things that I'd like to tell you about my trip. I'm just going to mention a few of them. Picture this: a group of rabbis, wearing yarmulkas, walking into an all-black…