Our CSA shares are nourishing both the bodies and the souls of our congregation!  Each week, congregants pick up a box of organic vegetables to bring home and one share is set aside, so that a group can cook up the food for congregants who might feel supported with a meal and some TLC (join the team Wednesdays at 5pm in the RS kitchen!).  In this week’s Torah portion, God instructs the Israelites to enjoy their bounty and also to set aside a portion and to give thanks.  In this month of Elul, may we consider the bounty for which we are grateful, and also the portions or ourselves, our energies, our tzedakah, that we would like to set aside for our community.  Learn about Caring Community opportunities here.

L’shanah tovah–Your RS Clergy

We can approach this season, this work of Cheshbon HaNefesh, the accounting of our souls, with a strategy. Find something to repeat. What is the power of repetition? Whether it is a phrase or a melody, when we repeat words or notes over and over again, we enable discovery. And it isn’t the discovery of the words or the melody we are repeating, for we already know those. In fact, we know them so well they can begin to lose their meaning and power. But in the repetition, we can train ourselves to encounter the familiar with new eyes. What idea, what phrase, what melody, what drumbeat, what pattern is speaking to you right now? Repeat it. It won’t change. But in the repeating, we tune out the familiar, and we discover. We may find new eyes into our own souls.

L’shanah tovah– Your RS Clergy

Amichai Lau-Lavie writes: The toothache started about two days ago, gentle at first. By Saturday night, though, it had upgraded from nagging ache to actual pain. With it came the harsh reality check that I haven’t been to a dentist in at least a year….So, on Saturday night, I did what I could: I went online to read about pain management, and how pain affects our mind and our soul. I particularly liked this quote from Marcel Proust:

“Illness is the doctor to whom we pay most heed; to kindness, to knowledge, we make promise only; pain we obey.”Continue reading

One of the ways we prepare in Elul is by “cheshbon ha-nefesh,” taking an accounting of our soul.  Anyone with an IRA or any kind of investment portfolio will take an accounting of our assets as often as possible, analyzing each item, and making changes when necessary.  We should do the same thing with all of our actions and words during the past year, and make changes when necessary.Continue reading

Too often, the hard work of the High Holy Days gives us an opportunity to beat ourselves up and tear ourselves down, to dwell only on our sins.  We recite the confessional prayer of “Al Cheyt…”  “For the sins we have sinned against You O God…”  In this prayer is a recitation of 44 sins, as an essential part of the High Holy Day process of “tshuvah,” repentance, atonement and an effort to improve our lives.

However, during this month of Elul, let us be more positive.  Let us look at what we did right, Continue reading

Last night, in a doc called “Weed,” CNN’s Dr. Sanjay Gupta, shared a compassionate and compelling apology.   Gupta explained that he had long reviewed the scientific literature on medical marijuana from the US and previously thought it was unimpressive, but has now reversed his position: “I now apologize,” said Gupta.

Dr. Gupta explained:  “I apologize because I didn’t look hard enough, … and I was too dismissive of the loud chorus of legitimate patients whose symptoms improved on cannabis… it is irresponsible not to provide the best care we can as a medical community, care that could involve marijuana.”Continue reading