CCOG Newsletter

This past Friday was the 25th anniversary of 9/11. If you were alive twenty-five years ago, you probably remember where you were and what you were doing when you heard the news. I was getting ready for school, and I heard the television on in the background. Before I even knew what was happening, I remember a thought came to my mind - "You will never forget this day". The motto for that day, "Never forget", has proven true in my life, and maybe yours as well.

What I hope to remember is the heroes who risked and even sacrificed their lives to rescue those who were in danger - the ones who took back control of flight 93 or the first responders who ran into a collapsing building while others were running out. I want to remember the bravery of men and women who are still battling the effects - mental and physical - of exposure to the wreckage. I remember that for a brief moment in time, we all were weeping with those who wept.

Too often we become divided by beliefs or politics or conspiracy theories. It is then that we fail to see others as human beings, made in the image of God, with the same experiences we have. Remember that it is the kindness of the Lord that leads us to repentance. Let's pray that God would allow us to see others through His eyes. Perhaps we might learn better how to love them and minister to them.

The noted Jewish philosopher Achad Ha’am once wrote: “More than the Jews have kept the Sabbath, the Sabbath has kept the Jews.”

The Sabbath is more than another ritual in Judaism; its essence permeates the very fabric of Jewish life. It is at the core of Jewish observance and the anchor of Jewish continuity.

More than anything, the Sabbath is a sacred point of connection with God. We work for six days in the material world, but on the seventh, the Sabbath, we recalibrate our focus on God and all things meaningful.

The significance of the Sabbath and its centrality to Jewish life is expressed in how we refer to the days of the week. Instead of separate names for each day, such as “Sunday,” “Monday,” etc., in Hebrew, the days of the week are named according to their proximity to the Sabbath. So Sunday is called “the first day (toward the Sabbath),” Monday is “the second day (toward the Sabbath),” and so on.

Only the seventh day, the Sabbath, has a name —Shabbat, which means “to rest.” However, while many people rest on the weekend so they may work the following week, we work during the week in order to rest on Shabbat. The Sabbath is the endpoint, the goal, the culmination of the week.

In today’s day and age, with the constant barrage of information and motion due to modern technology, the Shabbat experience is more important than ever. Perhaps there is no generation more in need of Shabbat than our own.