IN OUR PRESENT MOMENT
Rabbi Janet Madden
There is no need to arouse our grieving hearts to mourn. We have been crying for quite some time now: for our living and our dead held in tunnels of terror, for the lands in which we live and their lost promise of safety, for our homeland for our dreams.
Our temples are besieged; our imagined future lies in ashes. We ask again and again, How? and Why? and Where are You? How long will we wander in this wilderness? How many will be canceled, silenced, vandalized, threatened, assaulted, murdered?
Grounded in our losses, we remember: We are not the first and will not be the last to seek reason and find hatred.
A prophet said: rocks and trees will reveal us as we hide from those who would destroy us.
But our prophet tells us we were selected before we were created in the womb, consecrated before we were born.
This is our bechira moment-- time to hold ever-tighter to our tree of life, its flowers our hopes, its fruits our values, our resilient hearts choosing life.
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