We met for our November tradition, a service about time, growing from Heschel’s writing about how shabbat is a cathedral in time. This year we focused more about living in this time – in this moment of so much fear and grief and uncertainty, with the need to avoid surrendering to despair.
You can download our liturgy here.
For Torah study we actually did Torah study of this week’s parshah – Genesis 18: 16-33, where Abraham argues with God about the coming destruction of Sodom. It’s a remarkable moment, and is the proof text for many parts of Jewish legal/textual tradition as this commentary by Rabbi Jonathan Sacks explores.
Our songs today included:
A setting of Lucille Clifton’s poem “the lesson of the falling leaves” written by our own Karen Escovitz/Otter: The Leaves Believe
We also did a setting of the lyrics from “We Shall Be Known” by Karisha Longaker to this tune for Psalm 150. This adaptation let us highlight the lyric ‘It is time now, and what a time to be alive.”
And once again we used Abigail Bengson’s “Despair Is a Tool of Empire”