The truth is I no longer even know what I’m crying about. At this point, I seem just to be yielding to the big blur of suffering.
Read moreRely on Compassion
I am walking around afraid. Not always afraid of something specific. My body is fueled by adrenaline and programmed by the epigenetics of generations of ancestors whose fear responses enabled their survival and mine. My soul has fluttered right out of my body. Is there any solid place where it can land?
Read moreIn the Ruins
I’m happy to offer my first essay for MyJewishLearning.com’s weekly Recharge newsletter. In this one, I lean into the fear and the attraction of sitting inside our pain and sorrow. It felt timely.
Read moreVayigash: Life Has Had Its Way
For me, looking back over this year, what stands out most is how many individual stories in our community reached their conclusions. Looking at them, suddenly, everything shifts. A story of individual trauma and triumph gives way to a larger story of life pouring through the details of circumstance. Every act, every turn of the story, is imbued with a greater knowingness. Seeds have borne fruit. Life has had its way.
Read moreArchitecture for the Divine
I sat in the resonating chamber of the Great Synagogue, just as I had stood at the Temple of Poseidon, and wondered about this human impulse to build a house for the gods. Why? We could go outside and worship on a mountain, or before an altar of ocean, or in the Italian countryside among colonnades of umbrella pines. But no, instead we build structures of great weight, at great expense, even though their bulging doric columns are designed to call to mind the trees just outside the door.
Read more