blogs/estibethelbaltocom

Sermon by Rabbi Dana Saroken

When and How and Where Will This End?  Choose A Battle:  For the Soul or the Safety of Our Nation

When I was growing up, I loved Broadway: From the Tap Dance Kid to A Chorus Line and everything in between. Nothing moved me or made me cry like a great performance and a standing ovation at the theater. Nowadays, Hamilton and Dear Evan Hanson are the tops of my list but then, this last summer, as some of you know, I saw Come From Away and I've been singing those songs and inspired by the story ever since.  So, of course I was thrilled that this week that so many of our congregants and the people of Baltimore ventured to the Hippodrome to see this magnificent story being told.

Now, truth be told, as a New Yorker, it took me 10 years to find my way to the theater as I couldn't imagine turning that tragic day into a musical. But soon enough I realized, that Come From Away wasn't really about the tragedy of 9-11, it was about how a community responded to the tragedy… with an extraordinary abundance of love.

For those who haven't yet seen the show.  The story begins in a faraway place called Gander, Newfoundland, a small community. A community with one traffic light.  When the planes (on 9-11) needed to be re-routed, they were sent there.  First it was one plane and then two then three and they kept coming and coming and coming until 38 planes had landed in Gander. More people had landed in Gander, then the entire population of Gander and as there was no plan for such a thing �" after all, who could have imagined?!?  Quickly word spread. One person told another told another and another and suddenly, the phones started ringing: People wanted to know what they could do. How they could help. They were willing to do anything, anything, for the strangers that had landed in their small community. And so it all began: Those who could cook, began making trays of  food. For hundreds of people, and then thousands. People with access to spaces like gyms schools and churches, offered to convert their spaces to sleep hundreds of people. The local pharmacist offered to fill anyone's prescriptions, the local grocery store instructed the people of Gander to take whatever they needed to provide for their visitors. “Just take it off the shelves” they said. Some people even took care of the animals who had been underneath the plane.  There was nothing they wouldn't do. But even that, to the people of gander didn't feel like enough. They started showing up with cell phones to enable the visitors were to reach out to family that felt so far away, they began to invite these total strangers into their homes.  More and more and more they just kept giving. They opened their homes and their hearts. They gave the best of their love. 

So much so that by the time the airplanes were allowed to fly again... a piece of their hearts stayed behind in Gander. On the plane ride home, the visitors created a scholarship fund that raised more than $1 million for the people of gander. So much so that when the pilot who flew one of those planes to Gander, was retiring, she insisted that she and her family take their last trip to Gander.  Relationships formed stayed strong, friendships ongoing, three days in Gander and love, turned strangers into friends.  It's amazing what kindness and generosity can do. They can transform the world. They can.

Perhaps there's no one who understand better what it meant to love, better than Fred Rogers. He understood, love shouldn't need to be earned, it's simply being human, made you worthy of love. 

This week, although the sun was shining bright and the weather was beautiful, there was a lot of darkness surrounding us.  In this morning's Torah reading, we opened up to a story that (had there been in a newspaper way back then ) would have headlined: “Two boys, of highly esteemed religious and community leader, found dead in their holy site”.  Those boys were Aaron's sons Nadav and Avihu.  Consumed by fire, their remains were carried out by their surviving cousins.  Their father Aaron and uncle Moses were determined to carry on.  Next, we observed Yom Ha'shoah, and remembered and honored the murders of six million Jews.  And then, we layered on the headlines of our day.  Just one week ago this morning, we learned of the horrible attack at the Chabad house in Poway.   A gunman whose mind was filled with hate who opened fire hurting four and killing Lori Kay, a 60 year old righteous woman who was there that day with her own daughter in order to honor her mother with Yizkor prayers.  Lori threw herself into the line of fire to save the lives of others.   The next day, this past Sunday, seven people were shot at a cookout in downtown Baltimore.  A few quiet days came and then on Wednesday - another gunman �" this time the attack was on the campus of Univesity of North Carolina at Charlotte.   In an alert that flashed across computer and phone screens all over campus, the instructions were spare but urgent: “Run, Hide, Fight. Secure yourself immediately.”  Six people were murdered and were it not for a student named Riley Howell who charged at the gunman, the shooter would have continued, the deaths would have increased.  Howell, like Lori Kay - gave his life to save lives.  The next day, On Thursday May 2^nd, there was a mass shooting downtown - 5 lives taken and yesterday, May 3rd - another 4 people were shot and killed in downtown Baltimore.  

Whether it's the campuses, the synagogues, the mosques, the churches or the streets...  Whether it's Columbine or Sandy Hook or Parkland or UNC or the countless school shootings in between…  It's time we asked ourselves and each other - where and when and how does this end?  

It is HARD.  Even for the most compassionate and caring to remain sensitized to the murders:  To the school shootings the church shootings the mosque shootings and even the synagogue shootings. We bounce back a little quicker each time, we carry on a little bit easier. We watch or read the news feeds a little faster, we turn the channels or the pages a bit easier, we feel less horror, we shed less tears.  

Our politicians have stalled in their responses.  Our leadership confused us into believing that the issues are too complicated, that the second amendment Right To Bear Arms is too important to be able to change things.  And so… there was Columbine and then Sandy Hook and then Parkland then Pittsburgh then Poway and so many massacres in between.  

But the rabbi of Poway refuses to stall or give up:  in his op-ed in the NYT on Monday, he promised, “From here on in I am going to be more brazen," he wrote in a  "And I'm going to use my voice until I am hoarse to urge my fellow Jews to do Jewish. To light candles before Shabbat. To put up mezuzas on their doorposts. To do acts of kindness. And to show up in synagogue �" especially this coming Shabbat."

The challenge for all of us... is how do WE grow more brazen?  How do WE use OUR voices until WE are hoarse trying to do what is right and good to improve our country and to ensure that every person, created b'tzelem Elohim - that every life has immeasurable value and worth?  And how do we stop ourselves from getting used to these attacks or killings. Because we can't allow ourselves to ignore the messages of the high schoolers in Parkland who swore “never again” and fought so hard because they're young enough and hopeful enough to believe that change can and must happen.  We have to believe that they were right/that they are right/ that there is always a way.  The people of New Zealand believed that change was possible:   After 50 people died in the mass shootings in New Zealand at two Christchurch mosques - it took them one month to change their gun laws.  Yes, they are smaller. Yes, their circumstances are different.  AND… they showed the world that when there is a need - anything is possible. 

Yesterday, my teenage son told me about a video that he saw online: There was a teenage boy who was trying to buy alcohol - he went store to store but he didn't have the right credentials and so he was repeatedly and unequivocally denied.  He then tried to buy cigarettes. Same thing - store after store and he was repeatedly and unequivocally denied. He tried to buy a lottery ticket - he went place to place and he was repeatedly and unequivocally denied and then he went to buy a gun and within 10 minutes - he had a rifle in his hand.  That shouldn't be.  That just shouldn't be.

Our Jewish traditions believe that Jews and all human beings should be able to self protect.  And yet our sages did not believe that everyone is entitled to own a weapon. (Avodah Zarah 15b) The Jewish sources can support either side in the debate on guns but on restricting access - the sources are crystal clear.  

And so today, on a week where Come From Away reminds us of the power of love and kindness to change humanity while the news reminds us of the power of hate to destroy humanity, is this the time that can (finally) take a stand? Perhaps your call is to put forth more love into the world: To realize that every action, every conversation is an opportunity to choose love or goodness or kindness and that all of those things can and do make a difference. Or maybe for those who can access audacious hope and faith and courage - we figure out how to limit access to guns in our country.  Before the death tolls become greater and the hearts become harder.  “Never again”! Promised those Parkland teenagers... what can we do to support that promise?  To keep our children safe? to keep our religious institutions safe?  To keep our citizens safe?  It's time we try.  It's time we try! Ss!