Cantor Vera's Corner
Cantor Vera's Message
June 2022
Dear chevre,
This is a month of big changes for our community, on the heels of some years now of big changes. Loren Goldstein’s four years as president of Temple Emanu-El have come to a close, and he has handed the baton to Jennifer Lampron. Executive Director Nancy LaFleur is retiring at the end of this month, as we welcome her successor, Lisa Anthony, and appreciate the smooth and effective transition in our temple’s office that they have created together. We feel ourselves emerging—God willing—from the confines of COVID, as we take stock again of who we are and how we want to go about being in the world. As I often ask in the last moments before we sing L’cha Dodi together on a Friday night: What, from the time before, do we want to take with us through the door opening into this new moment? And what do we leave behind?
At a clergy meeting last month, a colleague of mine said ruefully, “Judaism is wired for continuity, not change.” I hear where he’s coming from. Our traditional rituals and behavior are built for endurance: Jewish separation from the world around us (in food, dress, rest time, language, law) is often presented as essential to Jewish survival, and the words of the Sh’ma exhort us to “teach these [commandments] to your children” (D’varim 6:6). Judaism values consistency and commitment. Jews read the same Torah every year, everyone everywhere all at once. We sing with whole hearts of keeping the flame of our faith burning l’dor vador, from generation to generation. Particular customs, dearly beloved, are passed down in families and in our community: a few examples are making latkes and baking hamantaschen as a community with our Chesed and Religious School Committees, reading the translation of each parashah aloud in our services, collecting food and clothing for Emmaus, and accumulating b’nei mitzvah kippot on the bust in the back of our sanctuary. When at age twenty-three I walked into a synagogue in Tbilisi, capital of the Caucasus Republic of Georgia, I took great comfort in the familiarity of Jewish ritual even when the music and setting were so different. Doing what our Jewish ancestors, physical and/or spiritual, have done before us is both an obligation and a privilege.
And yet, I believe that we are also wired for change. Jews are a people who have passed through the narrows of restrictions and prejudice and remade ourselves on the other side, in new and freely chosen identity. That took so much getting used to that we have a whole ritual for letting the spiritual dust of the freedom journey settle (counting the Omer till Shavuot lands!). But we made it, and we make it. Judaism celebrates creativity and innovation! The Judaism we practice now owes just as much if not more to on-one-foot rabbinic meaning-making and adaptation, amid the rubble of the Second Temple, as to the Five Books of Moshe. Personal Jewish innovative logic, svara, informed by but not bound by precedent, is so important that the Talmud upholds some halakhic rulings based on it even when they contradict other rulings based on precedent. There is now an entire modern yeshiva, school, of queer Talmud study named “Svara: A Traditionally Radical Yeshiva.” Svara operates within the context of tradition, not outside of it. And when new conditions make repeating exactly what beloved custom came before impossible, svara gives our tradition room to breathe and grow.
So where has our svara led us, as a Temple Emanu-El community, these past few years? It’s led us to adapt how we pray and learn and feed one another’s bodies and souls. It’s led us to the great outdoors, to opening every window in our shul that can open, to dropped-off meals and packages and cards. It’s led us into the wilds of Zoom and composite videos. It’s led us to put masks on when we need to and take them off when we can. It’s led us to welcome the creativity and energy of rabbinic interns and a rabbi-educator and new staffing configurations for our temple. It’s led us to start thinking more seriously about antiracism work and a Jewish spiritual lens on climate change. It’s led us to collaborate consistently and successfully with other communities, to make the format and schedule of committee meetings and classes more accessible to a wider range of people and living situations.
And, exercising our communal svara has helped us to identify those parts of our tradition that we hold most dear, which guard us as we guard them: coming together for Friday nights and Saturday mornings. Studying our parashiyot. Talking about Israel regularly, at Israel Chavurah. Singing together, through thick and thin, air and Wi-Fi. Giving our Temple youth a Jewish education grounded in our community’s values and practices. Providing learning and enrichment for our adult community. Helping our elders thrive and know that you are valued. Reaching out to our interfaith community for mutual support and education. Looking for what brokenness in the world is ours to fix and applying our considerable energies and resources to those tasks. These are the things that we continue to do, here at Temple Emanu-El.
So, as we open up our doors and windows to this summer and all that lies beyond it, what do you want to continue? Hold fast to it. And what new opportunities might your, and our, svara create? Let them bloom.
With love and anticipation,
Cantor Vera
This is a month of big changes for our community, on the heels of some years now of big changes. Loren Goldstein’s four years as president of Temple Emanu-El have come to a close, and he has handed the baton to Jennifer Lampron. Executive Director Nancy LaFleur is retiring at the end of this month, as we welcome her successor, Lisa Anthony, and appreciate the smooth and effective transition in our temple’s office that they have created together. We feel ourselves emerging—God willing—from the confines of COVID, as we take stock again of who we are and how we want to go about being in the world. As I often ask in the last moments before we sing L’cha Dodi together on a Friday night: What, from the time before, do we want to take with us through the door opening into this new moment? And what do we leave behind?
At a clergy meeting last month, a colleague of mine said ruefully, “Judaism is wired for continuity, not change.” I hear where he’s coming from. Our traditional rituals and behavior are built for endurance: Jewish separation from the world around us (in food, dress, rest time, language, law) is often presented as essential to Jewish survival, and the words of the Sh’ma exhort us to “teach these [commandments] to your children” (D’varim 6:6). Judaism values consistency and commitment. Jews read the same Torah every year, everyone everywhere all at once. We sing with whole hearts of keeping the flame of our faith burning l’dor vador, from generation to generation. Particular customs, dearly beloved, are passed down in families and in our community: a few examples are making latkes and baking hamantaschen as a community with our Chesed and Religious School Committees, reading the translation of each parashah aloud in our services, collecting food and clothing for Emmaus, and accumulating b’nei mitzvah kippot on the bust in the back of our sanctuary. When at age twenty-three I walked into a synagogue in Tbilisi, capital of the Caucasus Republic of Georgia, I took great comfort in the familiarity of Jewish ritual even when the music and setting were so different. Doing what our Jewish ancestors, physical and/or spiritual, have done before us is both an obligation and a privilege.
And yet, I believe that we are also wired for change. Jews are a people who have passed through the narrows of restrictions and prejudice and remade ourselves on the other side, in new and freely chosen identity. That took so much getting used to that we have a whole ritual for letting the spiritual dust of the freedom journey settle (counting the Omer till Shavuot lands!). But we made it, and we make it. Judaism celebrates creativity and innovation! The Judaism we practice now owes just as much if not more to on-one-foot rabbinic meaning-making and adaptation, amid the rubble of the Second Temple, as to the Five Books of Moshe. Personal Jewish innovative logic, svara, informed by but not bound by precedent, is so important that the Talmud upholds some halakhic rulings based on it even when they contradict other rulings based on precedent. There is now an entire modern yeshiva, school, of queer Talmud study named “Svara: A Traditionally Radical Yeshiva.” Svara operates within the context of tradition, not outside of it. And when new conditions make repeating exactly what beloved custom came before impossible, svara gives our tradition room to breathe and grow.
So where has our svara led us, as a Temple Emanu-El community, these past few years? It’s led us to adapt how we pray and learn and feed one another’s bodies and souls. It’s led us to the great outdoors, to opening every window in our shul that can open, to dropped-off meals and packages and cards. It’s led us into the wilds of Zoom and composite videos. It’s led us to put masks on when we need to and take them off when we can. It’s led us to welcome the creativity and energy of rabbinic interns and a rabbi-educator and new staffing configurations for our temple. It’s led us to start thinking more seriously about antiracism work and a Jewish spiritual lens on climate change. It’s led us to collaborate consistently and successfully with other communities, to make the format and schedule of committee meetings and classes more accessible to a wider range of people and living situations.
And, exercising our communal svara has helped us to identify those parts of our tradition that we hold most dear, which guard us as we guard them: coming together for Friday nights and Saturday mornings. Studying our parashiyot. Talking about Israel regularly, at Israel Chavurah. Singing together, through thick and thin, air and Wi-Fi. Giving our Temple youth a Jewish education grounded in our community’s values and practices. Providing learning and enrichment for our adult community. Helping our elders thrive and know that you are valued. Reaching out to our interfaith community for mutual support and education. Looking for what brokenness in the world is ours to fix and applying our considerable energies and resources to those tasks. These are the things that we continue to do, here at Temple Emanu-El.
So, as we open up our doors and windows to this summer and all that lies beyond it, what do you want to continue? Hold fast to it. And what new opportunities might your, and our, svara create? Let them bloom.
With love and anticipation,
Cantor Vera
Cantor Vera's Video Teachings
Cantor Vera's Writings
D'var for Pesach 5780/2020 (video)
"Practicing Failure, Cultivating Resilience," d'var for Yom Kippur 5780/2019
D'var for Kol Nidrei 5780/2019
"Israeli and American Jewish Identity," d'var for 1st Day of Rosh Hashanah 5780/2019
"The Geir Without and Within," d'var for 1st Day of Rosh Hashanah 5779/2018
"Ki Hinei Kachomeir: Desiring our Yeitzer," for Kol Nidrei 5779/2018
Cantor Vera's Report on Trip to San Diego and Tijuana with T'ruah in July 2018
"Practicing Failure, Cultivating Resilience," d'var for Yom Kippur 5780/2019
D'var for Kol Nidrei 5780/2019
"Israeli and American Jewish Identity," d'var for 1st Day of Rosh Hashanah 5780/2019
"The Geir Without and Within," d'var for 1st Day of Rosh Hashanah 5779/2018
"Ki Hinei Kachomeir: Desiring our Yeitzer," for Kol Nidrei 5779/2018
Cantor Vera's Report on Trip to San Diego and Tijuana with T'ruah in July 2018