In 2018, following the shooting at Congregation Tree of Life in Pittsburg, I created this video with the words you see below.
Today, how tragic that we add yet another act of senseless hate to this list of violence. The school shooting in Uvalde, Texas leaves us grief-stricken.
But it can not relegate us to paralysis.
We live in one of the most educated times in history. And yet we continue to allow guns to get into the hands of people with nefarious intentions. Please, take a moment in time to hold close those you love. Hold them extra close.
And take an additional moment in time to write…. Write to your elected officials. Write to your newspapers. Let them know that enough is enough. “We will not stand by idly while our neighbors bleed” (Lev. 19:16).
”We Are”
by Rabbi Zachary R. Shapiro, 2018. Updated in 2022
We are Parkland.
We are Newtown.
We are Orlando.
We are Las Vegas.
We are Charlie Hedbo.
We are Virginia Tech
We are Charleston
We are San Bernadino
We are Laramee
We are Oklahoma City
We are Columbine
We are the Congregation Tree of Life in Pittsburgh
We are Thousand Oaks
We are Chistchurch
We are Sri Lanka
We are Poway
We are Atlanta
We are Boulder
We are Buffalo
We are Uvalde, Texas
We are
We are all these places where violence and hate crimes have inflicted terror on humanity.
And today WE are Culver City, and we bring a message of SHALOM
We are Jews
We are Christians
We are Muslims
We are Hindus, Shiks, and Bhuddists. We are Bahai
We are atheists and agnostics.
We pray to God, to Adonai, to Allah.
We love our children.
We are black, we are white, we are Latino. We are Asian. We are LGBTQ.
We are Democrats. We are Republicans.
We are immigrants. We are native.
We are survivors.
We are redeemers.
We are.
We are and we love and we dream and we hope.
We are.
We pray and we listen. We embrace and we care.
We are.
We march toward truth. We replace darkness with light.
We are.
We pursue justice. We march for peace. We gather with unity.
We fight the evils of antisemitism, a disease that has plagued Judaism – and all who care about humanity – for 3500 years.
We inherit the right to be safe in our schools, our houses of worship, and our places of recreation.
We inherit the responsibility to demand more of our community when that safety is compromised.
We are.
And we always will be.
As the prophet, Amos taught, “Let justice roll down like water, and righteousness like a mighty stream.”
For the authors, that legacy embodies the book’s central message: that even in the face of unbearable loss, compassion, presence and community can help transform grief into an enduring act of care.
This is where the Holocaust story begins – not in the gas chambers of Auschwitz, but earlier, with the Nazi regime’s Aktion T4 program, a state-sponsored campaign to murder people with disabilities.
For the Jewish community, this threat is particularly severe because Jewish life is built around proximity, continuity and intergenerational relationships.
Long before shakshuka became a brunch staple and Israeli restaurants multiplied across the city, Admony was introducing New Yorkers to the flavors she had grown up with in Israel.
Several surveys showed that there is substance to the claim that a degree of Jewish “strengthening” is evident in the Israeli public. However, all the studies so far have dealt with adult society.
This may be Israel’s blind spot. The system is exceptionally good at creating biomedical startups but not equally optimized for turning the strongest of them into enduring global companies.
We may not remember every conversation or every accomplishment, but we remember how people made us feel. In the end, it is those ordinary acts of kindness that stay with us the longest.
It is possible that a record four Jewish candidates will be on a debate stage, vying to become the Democratic nominee for the 2028 presidential election.
While I understand and sympathize with the issues confronting Conservative rabbis and synagogues in the United States concerning intermarriage, allowing Conservative rabbis to officiate at intermarriages will not solve that problem.
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