Sermon #3 – Reigniting Family Pride
A few nights ago, on Saturday, just after Shabbat ended, we gathered together here, along with members of Beth Israel in Media, for the Selichot service which introduces the High Holiday season.
Selichot is kind of like the pre-game warm up show, or the “Look-alive-people-the-holidays-are-around-the-corner” service. Either way, it’s an opportunity to brush up on some of the tunes that repeat themselves throughout the holidays; it’s a chance to start reflecting on where you yourself are, going into the holidays; and we usually include a study session to start thinking about the themes of the holidays.
So sure enough, we talked about Teshuva, repentence. No big surprise there. But we wanted to be a bit more focused than that, so Rabbi Linda Potemken of Beth Israel and I brought in the subject of the family. How do we ask forgiveness of our family members, and seek to repair relationships within our own families? To get the discussion started, we each selected a number of poems that focused on family issues, and that got our conversation going. I would like to share one of those poems with you right now.
To read the poem, “Family at War,” by Judy Karbritz, please click here.
Today’s sermon is the next installment in my High Holiday series on Pride. My vision for this series is that the word “Pride” is like a pebble, dropped in a body of water, and the different areas of Pride that I’ll be talking about are like rippling circles that expand and grow inside all of us. Each sermon is a new circle, that I hope can inspire you to think about how to make changes for yourself, your family, and your community in the year ahead. Yesterday we talked about how to feel pride in oneself, and today I would like to move outwards to what I consider the next essential ring; the family.
I can’t tell you how often I have already heard about family feuds – much like the one in Judy Karbritz’s poem – both in this congregation, in past congregations, among colleagues and friends, and seemingly wherever I go. It’s almost ubiquitous, with nearly every one of us having someone in the family we don’t talk to, or two family members who don’t speak to one another, or a black sheep whom everyone avoids! Why does this happen? Before we can speak about feeling pride in one another, let us examine what might cause the opposite emotions; envy, frustration, disappointment, and rage.
I want to begin back in our Torah reading this morning; the Binding of Isaac. Why is this story so disturbing to grapple with, yet so essential for us to read? Because it is about the damage we can cause one another within the family. We know each other so well, we grew up together, we cried in front of one another, and we’ve been our most immature, scared, humiliated, and embarrassing in front of each other. And we know, better than anyone else, how to push each other’s buttons! Family can be the source of so much joy, comfort, support, and love; but also so much pain, anguish, and heartache.
Even more so than for us today, Abraham, Sarah, and Isaac only had each other. Abraham had left his homeland, and his nephew, Lot, had moved on to greener pastures. So when Sarah saw her husband and son set off together, she felt certain they would take care of one another. And Isaac, leaving with his father on a hunting trip, felt he had nothing to fear, that he could always trust his father to shield him from harm.
But God had given Abraham different instructions. It turns out God could trust him, but Abraham’s family members, not so much. It’s almost unimaginable, putting yourself in Abraham’s sandals, knowing what is expected of you, having to look your wife and son in the eyes, and go through with God’s request. Our rabbis tell us that the hardest part of the entire ordeal for Abraham was having to walk back down off that mountain. Yes, they are all safe, but now he has to face his family and figure out how to rebuild these broken relationships.
Now perhaps some of you are thinking to yourselves, “Rabbi, come on! No one here is about to tie their child to an altar and offer them as a sacrifice to God!!” And I certainly hope you’re right. But let go of your literal-mindedness for a minute. Are you telling me parents never hurt their children today in pursuit of their own ambitions? No, they don’t physically tie them to altars, but they might bind them metaphorically to unrealistic expectations. They don’t turn them into offerings, but some use their children to try and realize unfulfilled dreams; to live vicariously through their successes in sports, or school, or in life...
Stop for a moment and realize that this story is truly speaking to us today. It reminds us how family members can injure one another, whether emotionally or otherwise, and that it can leave real and long-lasting scars.
So today I implore us all to begin to turn things around. Yes, we spend a lot of the holiday either praying or eating… after all, this IS a Jewish holiday. But it should also be a time for apologies and making changes. Judaism teaches us that we cannot apologize to God for the wrong we have done another human being; we have to apologize directly to that person. Or perhaps you genuinely feel that the wrong was done by the other person; then this season can be one of accepting apologies. This should be a season of letting go, freeing yourself and someone else of something that weighs down on you both; whether through offering, or accepting, a “sorry.”
Judy Karbritz’s poem was written in the third person – watching this happen between other people – which reminds us that everyone in the family is affected, even if the feud, the broiges, was only between two people. The next story in the Torah after ours tells us of the death of Sarah. The rabbis link it back to the Binding of Isaac, further supporting the idea that family members are all affected. Sarah was nowhere near the altar, but she was deeply impacted by this dramatic ordeal nonetheless, and the rabbis say it ultimately killed her.
On Saturday mornings, I read a small paragraph out loud in front of the Ark, right before the Cantor sings “Bei Ana Racheitz” and just prior to removing the Torah scrolls. Usually I just read the translation of the song we sing, but sometimes I substitute it with one or another English reading I find meaningful, and which also speaks about the Torah and our relationship to it. One of those readings is actually a personal, family meditation, but when I include it in the service, I make a few adjustments so it will apply to the congregation. In that prayer, the following phrase speaks directly to our topic this morning: “Save us from dissension and jealousy; shield us from pettiness and rivalry. May selfish pride not divide us; may pride in one another unite us.”
Can we learn to feel pride in one another again? How do we turn things around, teshuva (a word that literally means “turn around”), to start seeing that the successes of those closest to us are our successes as well? Jealousy, pettiness, rivalry - they are unfortunately easy to fall back into. Let us strive to claw our way out, and instead feel joy, excitement, and pride for our family members.
As I mentioned earlier, I compare these sermons on Pride to a pebble dropping in a pond, and the rippling circles that extend out from the center. How can we continue on to the next ring, to celebrate and enjoy the pride we feel for our community, the Jewish people, or our country, when we are carrying around strong negative emotions?
This High Holiday season, give yourself a gift. Reward yourself with the gift of forgiveness, of abandoning past grudges and ill-will.
In a few moments, Cantor Friedrich will once again share with us his beautiful rendition of the Hineni, the prayer that leads us into the Silent Amidah. Yesterday we spoke about how the Hineni is said in the singular, “Here I am.” Indeed, we do all stand before God as individuals. Our lives are unique, our perspectives are our own, and we will ultimately each make our choices and live with the consequences of our own actions. But look around the Sanctuary. We stand as individuals, but as a large group of individuals. So often we feel utterly alone, and believe that no one understands what we’re going through; when in reality we are dealing with the same challenges and struggles as the person sitting right beside us.
Judy Karbritz reminds us that the first step towards creating a world at peace can be the resolving of conflicts within the family. Let us learn from our history, from our religious texts, from modern poetry, and from one another - and thereby be united by pride in one another... and a reignited sense of pride in our families.
Shana Tovah U’metukah - May you all have a Happy, Healthy, and Liberating New Year.
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