Sermon

Kol Nidre 5764

Low Hanging Fruit

 

                  Tonight, we are gathered together in all our glorious variety as were our ancestors on the shores of Jordan. In tomorrow morning's Torah portion, we will read how all facets of the Jewish community; men, women and children; young and old were all gathered before Moses prior to entry into the Promised Land. And in that same way, here we are; men, women and children of all ages, gathering together before God this Kol Nidre night. Moses notes as well that those arrayed before him included not only every member of Israel but also the stranger in their camp. In Hebrew, a stranger is a ger, which connotes someone who, while not a full member of the tribe, is welcome and who holds a certain status within the community. Tonight, we too count within our community many gerim, non-Jewish members whose participation and support enriches our congregation and who have dedicated themselves to the well-being of the Jewish community and to the Jewish future. Furthermore, Moses makes the point that those arrayed before him are making a covenant with God not only on behalf of themselves but on behalf of those who are not there as well. This has particular resonance for us. For as I look out over this congregation I see so many who were not here with us last year; some because they are new members and some because they are new people. It has been the greatest joy of this, my first year in Austin, to be able to name so many children and to join with you in welcoming them into the Temple Beth Shalom family and into the Jewish people. As a congregation, we have experienced tremendous growth, nearly doubling in membership since last year and we are profoundly grateful for each and every member of this, our faith community. Lori, our daughters and I feel truly blessed to have been able to share this exciting and inspiring year with you, our fellow congregants and friends.

                  This has also been a year in which we have strengthened our covenant with each other to make Temple Beth Shalom a place where each of us can fulfill our potential as Jews and as human beings. It has been a year of accomplishment in many fields as well as a year in which we have begun to access our future together. We have re-dedicated ourselves to maintaining the open and welcoming congregation that we are, while moving to meet the ever-growing spiritual and educational needs of our congregation.

                  It is tempting on Kol Nidre night to speak of a lofty future for our temple, to introduce far reaching new projects, to speak broadly of our temple's needs and dreams. Tonight, however, I am going to resist that temptation and focus instead on some of our immediate needs as a community. Despite our successes, we have some issues which, while hardly earthshaking, are nonetheless profound. Our ability to address these issues will shape the future of our temple. We truly have an opportunity to be a different kind of congregation but we have to decide now, this year, what kind of congregation we want to be. This decision, and the steps we take now, will determine if we will have a community that will be worthy of the much larger dreams and challenges that lie ahead.

                  What follows is what is known in the business world as low hanging fruit. All of the following ideas are relatively easy to implement if we have the will to do so. As an added bonus, all of them are absolutely free. None of them requires an expenditure of money, only of time, energy and attention.

                  The first is in the area of worship. We need to establish and maintain a regular bi-weekly Shabbat morning service in addition to our already popular Torah study. Now, in saying this I am trying very hard not to be a scold. A congregant recently told me that all that she remembers about High Holy Day services when she was a kid was the rabbi berating everybody for not coming to services enough. That's not the point here. A Shabbat morning service needs to be supported both for our children and for ourselves. Our children need to learn Shabbat morning liturgy and its elements not only in preparation for bar and bat mitzvah but also because one can not function meaningfully in the Jewish world without knowing Shabbat morning liturgy. It is our job as a community to prepare our children to be lifelong Jews and we can not do so without giving them an opportunity to participate in and lead Shabbat morning services.

                  Worship on Shabbat morning is also the hallmark of a serious and mature Jewish community. Shabbat morning is the appropriate time to read Torah and study together. The themes of the service are different than Friday night as are the rituals. Shabbat morning services are also a natural vehicle for increased lay participation. As we have seen demonstrated during this High Holy Day season, we have many members who are capable of reading Torah and Haftorah portions. We also have members who are capable of leading Torah study and worship on a Shabbat morning. Moreover, if we are unable to maintain a regular Shabbat morning minyan, then Shabbat morning services will occur only on those weekends when we have a bar or bat mitzvah ceremony. Inevitably, those occasions will quickly become family affairs rather than services. We need not have that happen here but the only way to avoid it is to establish regular Shabbat morning worship and have the b'nai mitzvah ceremonies fit within that context. The choice is ours.

                 

                  The next area is that of education. A great congregation is also a community of learners. In order to foster lifelong Jewish learning, we are establishing a Board of Education to coordinate and facilitate our educational programming from Torah Tots to Adult Education. In particular, are expanding our adult education offerings this year with the addition of a four part program on Shabbat in the Fall and a program on Pesach in the Spring. These are in addition to the regularly scheduled lunch and learn sessions on the second Wednesday of each month. There are also multiple educational opportunities throughout our community which everyone is urged to attend, particularly the Tapestry of Jewish Learning which will take place in January. Each and every individual here should pledge to attend at least one educational event in our community this year. There is an old expression that one can not love what one does not know. We can not develop a love of Judaism, we can not truly incorporate Judaism into our lives, unless we know more about it. The scope of Jewish learning is so great-- from liturgy to literature, from cooking to Rav Kook. Let's all learn something to enhance our Judaism this year, for in doing so we enhance our relationship with God.

                  With the addition of weekday Hebrew school and the establishment of a formal curriculum, we have continued to improve the quality of our children' religious education. A key element of the curriculum is an increased opportunity for family education during Sunday school. There will be increased opportunities to study with your children and to participate in, not just observe, their education. The attendance of parents and other supportive members of the community is critical. Likewise, everyone is invited to attend our Sunday morning t'fillah. It meets in the community hall at 9:30 every Sunday when religious school is held. It is a 30 minute learners service that is geared to our school age children but the Sunday morning t'fillah is an opportunity for everyone to see our kids in action and to learn more about the prayer service. The ongoing support of our parents through attendance at this service is a source of great pride for our temple. Now, let us expand that commitment to everyone else in the community. I also urge that as space and timing permit, we begin to schedule meetings, events and educational programs on Sunday mornings following t'fillah. Let us take this opportunity to come together in prayer, education and fellowship.

                                    Lastly, we need to address a deeper cultural concern within our congregation and I must speak frankly in this regard. The small number of families who founded this congregation or who have been active since its inception need to have their efforts supplemented by our newer members. Let me make it official, if you have joined Temple Beth Shalom within the past year or two, you are now officially an old-timer. Your temple is looking to you for leadership and participation. We need new blood and we need to see new faces at the table. This takes several forms.

                  First, when we are at services or any other temple gathering, we are all responsible to greet and welcome potential new members and friends. We are all ambassadors for Temple Beth Shalom. Each of us was accorded a warm, if not overwhelming, welcome when we first came into the community. It is time that we all participated in passing that along to others. This includes not only greeting newcomers at services, but making an active effort to invite newer members to temple events and into our homes.

                  Second, we need to take our participation in congregational events and projects up to a new level. We need to involve others in what we do. If you are planning to attend services, call a friend, particularly a new one, and ask them to come along. If you are doing a social action project, involve another family. Vital congregations have services and events that are well attended and community action projects that are supported by the entire congregation because congregants see the temple as a place to be with friends. There is a social aspect to Judaism; Jews do things in conjunction with one another.

                  In addition, each of us needs to try some new type of congregational activity this year. Too many of us have segregated ourselves unnecessarily. Having children should not be an obstacle to adult education and being an empty nester or young adult need not bar you from Tot Shabbat. There are no services, social events or social action projects that are only for one segment of our congregation. We need to plan activities so as to encourage the participation of all congregants in the things that we do. Our challenge as we grow is to maintain our sense of community and not to divide ourselves into a collection of constituency groups that come together a couple of times a year.

                  Lastly, we need more people involved in temple leadership. We need everyone to take on a committee or task force assignment this year. We need fresh ideas and energy. The leadership of this congregation is making a concerted effort to involve others and create opportunities for new leadership. Sometimes, involvement in the congregation can seem daunting in the face of the many demands of everyday life. In these formative years of this congregation, there has been a core of families that have seemingly made Temple Beth Shalom their life's work. Part of the reason is that new congregations need that kind of attention. Another reason is that there are so few families to do the work. On both counts, we are now past that stage. We have reached a level of membership and organizational maturity that involvement in the temple is no longer a 10 hour a day commitment but that will be so only if we are all ready to do the work. Everyone in this room needs to pick something to do for Temple Beth Shalom this year. Come help build the sukkah, plan a Sisterhood program, help organize a social action project, write an article for the Outlook, the list is endless but so are the opportunities to make our congregation great.

                  So that's my list of low hanging fruit. None of them are dramatic, expensive or really time consuming. All of them will make a profound difference in who we are as a community. We do have a great opportunity here in Temple Beth Shalom but we must not be trapped by our own low expectations or outmoded models of congregational life. No amount of professional staff and no building is going to do this for us. Those are only resources, not a reason for being. And the time to set our culture and our expectations of our temple and each other is now; not when we are 200, 300 or 400 families because then it will be too late. If we are blessed with continued growth, it will be our turn to impart to those new families a culture of inclusiveness and participation; a culture that says that in this temple we reject passive drive-by Judaism; that in this temple we find God when we find each other. May this be our teshuvah for the new year, to reach our potential as a congregation and, in doing so, to help each other reach our potential as Jews, friends and as children of God. May this be God's will for us, Amen.