Community coming together to mourn at Lakeside 7-2-14

The past 24 hours have been particularly painful as we all learned of the death of  Eyal Yirach, Gilad Shaar and Naftali Frenkel, may their memories be a blessing.  It is hard to watch all the news, social media and television coverage of this tragic event.  I know that many people's first response is: How do we respond?  What can we do?

First I have two wonderful websites for teachers, parents and others coping with this situation:
From the Icenter and from the Jewish Education Center of Cleveland.  Both of these sites talk about a Jewish response and how to talk to children.  The JECC site also has Jewish texts to refer to and the ICenter site encourages us to discuss values as we talk with our students.

I think the most natural Jewish response is to pray.  In this vein 13 Congregations on the North Shore are coming together Wednesday July 2nd at 7:00 pm at Lakeside Congregation to pray.  It is unusual to have that many congregations pray together in the middle of the summer, Reform and Conservative shuls.  It is very comforting and I hope that many people will join us and feel the comfort all around.  I know that I am looking forward to praying with friends, colleagues, and congregants.

Please remember that Ravinia traffic may be heavy tomorrow so please leave enough time to get to Lakeside by 7:00pm.

Thankful for Community, Kehillah, Community

Sometimes by Thursday night I am all out of energy after a long week.  Last week was long indeed and this week looks to be even longer.  Last Thursday on my way to pick up one son my car's battery decided to stall out.  At least I was at the gas station when the battery died.  I knew I had a shiva minyan to lead in 2 hours and although it was not particularly cold or snowy I was worried that AAA would be busy.  I quickly called Douglas Towing, I know the owners and who comes to jump my battery but my former Bar Mitzvah student and gives me a big hug.  He immediately jumped my car and when I asked how much I owed he said nothing. Don't worry I gave him a nice tip. That's my community.

I then made my way to the shiva minyan for a Lakeside congregant, on time I might add and although shiva's are by nature sad, I was very happy to see many congregants in attendance including many of my B'nai Mitzvah students who are friends of the grandchildren.  They did a nice job helping me lead t'filot. That's my community.

This week I know my community will be here as I go in February 19 for a "scope" of my knee.  I have been limping around for a month and believe this will be the answer for me.  It is an easy process one done at a clinic as an out patient process.  I have cleared my calendar for a week and having just said that hope to be back at work sooner than later.

There is a great blog post going around by Coffee Shop Rabbi giving reasons why people should join synagogues.  She mentions being able to pray with a community and being a part of a caring community as just a few of the reasons why she likes being a member of a synagogue (even though she herself is a Rabbi).  I too like being part of a community and will send out updates on how the "scope" goes tomorrow.  Many people have checked in already and I thank them for that.  It's just  too bad I can't tweet the surgery.  I bet that would get a lot of hits.