Monday, November 14, 2016


D'var Torah - Post-Election
Friday, November 11, 2016, at Temple Sinai, Brookline MA
Parashat Lech L'cha 

This Shabbat, we find ourselves facing a future filled with uncertainty, and we are entering into a world in which we do not know what may face us.

In the days after the election, both Rabbi Shoshana and I have been approached by members of our community who are deeply shocked by the results, people who are stunned and confused, people who are fearful for the future, who are experiencing anxiety about what lies ahead.  Almost everyone we’ve spoken to had a strong emotional reaction.

The road ahead is uncertain, and we don’t know where it will lead.  We truly don’t know. 

We face an important personal and spiritual challenge in these days when we’ve been cast into a period of deep uncertainty, anxiety and even fear for ourselves, for the Jewish people, for those people in our world who are of color, or immigrants, or religious and ethnic minorities – the whole world, in fact, is walking into a place of deep uncertainty, into the unknown.

The week of the election fell during the Torah portion of Lech L’cha, with God’s words to Abraham:  “Go, you, from your land, from your parents’ home, from the place of your birth, to a land that I will show you… and I will make you a great nation… I will make your name great.”  (Genesis 12:1-3)

I can imagine Abraham’s reaction: “Lech L’cha” – what?  Go where?  Go where?  Abraham did not know the land to which God was leading him towards.   God said: “I will show you the place, but not now.”  Abraham was told by God to go to a place, from that which was comfortable, to a place indeterminate and unknown. 

The Sefas Emes, Rabbi Yehudah Aryeh Lieb of Ger, the Gerer Rebbe, 19th century, taught that as human beings, each one of us is a “walker” – we are all travelers on a road.  None of us ever knows where we are going, none of us ever knows what lies ahead.  There is always an aspect of life which is hidden from us, and which we cannot see on our own.

But he taught:  Two things made Abraham different, and gave Abraham a certain greatness.

First, Abraham recognized that there is no other choice but to go forward.  Abraham found a source of resilience to keep on truckin’ when faced with uncertainty.  That source is available to us, as well.  By accepting the reality that we have to go forward toward uncertainty, by standing up straight, upright, and just walking forward greeting that uncertainty with openness, we grow. 

Second, Abraham lived out the quality of chesed, loving-kindness.  In the mystical-symbolic tradition of Judaism, Abraham is associated with chesed, which is care and concern within the framework of relationship.  He personified love and compassion, listening, understanding, seeing the downtrodden and the outcast, and responding to them with a whole heart.  This was not just Abraham’s way of dealing with others, it was the way in which Abraham served God:  with full-hearted love.  Abraham’s chesed was his way of living even when he was walking toward the unknown, to “the place that I will show you.”  While he was traveling to this undetermined place, the place-to-be-named later, Abraham treated everyone he met softly, carefully, gently, lovingly. 

What made Abraham great?  For the Sefas Emes, “greatness” is living our lives with the quality of chesed – opening your heart to others and approaching them with compassion on their journeys, even when you don’t know exactly where your journey is taking you.

I share the deeply worry and concern at what it seems the future may hold for us.  Those of us who are still stunned by the election’s results do need some time to get over our shock.  But like Abraham, it will soon be time to embrace the future, to stand up, and to keep walking forward.  If we can adopt Abraham’s stance of chesed, of loving-kindness as a basic and fundamental way for conducting ourselves, being sensitive to the pain and suffering of others around us by responding to them, we, too, can bring healing and repair into the world, which the world sorely needs.

-        Rabbi Andy Vogel

Wednesday, November 2, 2016

Interfaith Clergy Letter, November 2, 2016

"Rejecting Hate: Statement of Interfaith Solidarity Against Islamophobia in Massachusetts"


As Boston-area religious and cultural leaders, we are committed to building a community that embraces people of different beliefs and practices, including our Muslim neighbors and friends. This work is particularly important in the present political climate, in which some public figures are voicing messages of intolerance and xenophobia, pitting segments of the American populace against one another.

It is for this reason that we are deeply concerned to learn of an event scheduled for November 2nd in Stoughton featuring three speakers whom the Southern Poverty Law Center has identified as anti-Muslim extremists or hate group leaders. Jerry Boykin, Frank Gaffney, and Tom Trento cast Islam as an inherently immoral faith, and spread conspiracy theories that Muslims are secretly infiltrating US and European governments as a “fifth column.”

For example, Mr. Gaffney has claimed that “most of the Muslim-American groups of any prominence in America are now known to be, as a matter of fact, hostile to the United States and its Constitution,” and Mr. Boykin has argued that “We need to realize that Islam itself is not just a religion - it is a totalitarian way of life. ... It should not be protected under the First Amendment, particularly given that those following the dictates of the Quran are under an obligation to destroy our Constitution and replace it with Sharia law.” This inflammatory rhetoric has no factual basis and directly fuels anti-Muslim discrimination and hate crimes.

Our houses of worship should be spaces for prayer, reflection, study, and community building. While free political debate is a vital element in our democracy, voices that demonize ethnic, racial, or faith groups have no place in our sanctuaries.

As clergy and organizational leaders seeking to cultivate a shared ethos of interreligious and cross-cultural cooperation, we the undersigned reach out to and call on Congregation Ahavath Torah to revoke their invitation to these individuals, all known purveyors of vitriol and acrimony. They, and the gross misinformation in which they traffic, are not deserving of a platform in our community.

In Peace,

Rev. Lois Adams - First Baptist Church of Sharon
Professor Rachel Adelman - Hebrew College
Fr. Jack Ahern – St. Mary Parish in Randolph
Rev. John Allen - First Congregational Church of Milton
Rabbi Katy Z. Allen - Ma'yan Tikvah - A Wellspring of Hope
Rabbi Sharon Cohen Anisfeld, Dean, The Rabbinical School of Hebrew College
Rev. Dr. Jim Antal - Minister and President, Massachusetts Conference, UCC
Marya Axner - New England Jewish Labor Committee
Dr. Angela Bauer-Levesque, Vice President for Academic Affairs and Dean; Harvey H. Guthrie Jr. Professor of Bible, Culture, and Interpretation Episcopal Divinity School, Cambridge, Massachusetts
Rabbi Howard A. Berman, Central Reform Temple, Boston
Rev. Eliza Blanchard - First Parish of Brookline
Rev. Beverly Boke – First Parish Unitarian Universalist Church of Canton
Rev. Dr. Christian Brocato - Rector, Saint Peter's Episcopal Church, Cambridge
Rev. Jeffrey Brown – Twelfth Baptist Church
Sister Marie-Thérèse Browne, SCN, Roman Catholic Sister
Rev. Rebecca Bryan - First Parish in Brookline
Rev. Dr. Karin Case - First Church in Cambridge, Congregational, UCC
Rev. Arrington Chambliss - Executive Director, Episcopal City Mission
Rev. Rebecca Cho - First United Methodist Church, Stoughton, MA
Fr. Brian Clary - Saint Mary of the Assumption, Brookline
Rev. Rainey G. Dankel - Associate Rector, Trinity Church in the City of Boston
Rev. Dr. Christopher Duraisingh - Professor Emeritus, Episcopal Divinity School
Rev. John Edgerton – Old South Church, Boston
Cantor Roy Einhorn - Temple Israel, Boston
Michael Felson - Executive Director Emeritus, Boston Workmen’s Circle
Rev. Kent French, Senior Pastor, The United Parish in Brookline
Rabbi Ronne Friedman - Senior Rabbi Emeritus, Temple Israel of Boston
Rabbi Shoshana Meira Friedman - Temple Sinai of Brookline
Joseph Gerson - American Friends Service Committee, New England Region
Rev Marlene Gil - Associate Executive Minister for Church Relations, American Baptist Churches of Massachusetts
Rabbi Neal Gold - Temple Shir Tikva
Rabbi Eric Gurvis – Senior Rabbi, Temple Shalom
Rev. Dr. Ray A. Hammond - Senior Pastor, Bethel AME Church
Rev. Wendy Vander Hart, Associate Conference Minister, MA Conference, United Church of Christ
Rev. Kim K. Crawford Harvie - Senior Minister, Arlington Street Church (Unitarian Universalist)
Rabbi/Cantor Anne Heath - Congregation Agudath Achim
Rabbi Suzie Jacobson - Temple Israel, Boston
Rabbi David Jaffe, The Kirva Institute, Sharon, MA
Rabbi Howard L. Jaffe - Temple Isaiah, Lexington
Rev. Laura Ruth Jarrett - Senior Pastor, Hope Central Church, Jamaica Plain
Rev. Edwin Johnson – St. Mary's Episcopal Church of Dorchester
Rabbi Randy Kafka - Temple Kol Tikvah, Sharon
Alice Kidder, Clerk, Cooperative Metropolitan Ministries
Rev. Dr. David A. Killian - President, Cooperative Metropolitan Ministries
Jen Kiok – Executive Director, Boston Workmen’s Circle
Idit Klein, Executive Director, Keshet
Rabbi Claudia Kreiman - Temple Beth Zion, Brookline
Rabbi Judith Kummer - Jewish Chaplaincy Council of Massachusetts
Rabbi Allan Lehmann - Hebrew College
Rabbi Ben Lanckton - Community Tikkun Leil Shavuot
Rabbi David Lerner, Temple Emunah, Lexington; President, Massachusetts Board of Rabbis
Rev. Rosemary Lloyd – The Conversation Project
Rev. Samuel T. Lloyd - Rector, Trinity Church in the City of Boston
Rev. Rob Mark - Church of the Covenant, Boston
Rabbi Emily Mathis - Temple Beth Avodah
Rev. Michael McGarry, C.S.P. - Director, The Paulist Center
Rev. Kathleen McTigue – UU College of Social Justice
Rabbi Bernard H. Mehlman, Senior Scholar, Temple Israel, Boston,
Rabbi Margot Meitner - The Meeting Point, Jamaica Plain
Rev. Jeffrey W. Mello, Rector, St. Paul's Episcopal Church, Brookline
Rabbi Jeremy S. Morrison - Temple Israel of Boston
Fr. Jerry Morrow SCP -- Rector, Saint John's Episcopal Church, Sharon
Dr. Vito Nicastro, A.D., E.&I. - Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston
Professor Padraic O’Hare – Founder, Center for the Study of Jewish-Christian-Muslim Relations at Merrimack College
Rev. Gerald J. Osterman – Immaculate Conception Parish
Riva Pearson - President, Boston Workmen’s Circle
Rabbi Barbara Penzner - Temple Hillel B'nai Torah
Rev. Mary Perry – First Congregational Church of Stoughton, UCC
Rev. Oscar J. Pratt, II - St. Katharine Drexel Parish
Fr. Rocco Puopolo, s.x. - Xaverian Missionaries
Rev. Cristina Rathbone - Cathedral Church of St. Paul, Boston
Rabbi Victor Reinstein – Nehar Shalom Community Synagogue
Rev. Don Remick, Associate Conference Minister, Massachusetts Conference UCC
Rev. Doug Robinson–Johnson – United Parish of Auburndale
Rev. Dr. Rodney Petersen – Executive Director, Cooperative Metropolitan Ministries
Rabbi Or Rose – Miller Center for Interreligious Learning and Leadership, Hebrew College
Rabbi Sonia Saltzman - Temple Ohabei Shalom
Scott Schaeffer-Duffy - Saints Francis & Thérèse Catholic Worker Community
Rabbi Rachel Schoenfeld - Shir Hadash
Rabbi Michael Shire - Hebrew College
Rev. Dr. Paul Shupe, Hancock United Church of Christ (Congregational), Lexington
Rev. Daniel Smith, Senior Minister, First Church in Cambridge, Congregational, UCC
Rabbi Matthew Soffer - Associate Rabbi, Temple Israel, Boston
Rabbi Toba Spitzer - Vice President of the Massachusetts Board of Rabbis
Rev. Burns Stanfield - President, Greater Boston Interfaith Organization and Pastor, Fourth Presbyterian Church, South Boston
Rabbi Keith Stern, Temple Beth Avodah
The Very Rev. John P. Streit, Jr. - Cathedral Church of St. Paul, Boston
Cantor Jodi Sufrin - Temple Beth Elohim, Wellesley
Rev. Stacy Swain - Union Church in Waban
Rev. Nancy Taylor – Senior Minister and CEO, Old South Church, Boston
Rabbi David Thomas - Congregation Beth El
Rabbi Andrew Vogel – Temple Sinai Brookline
Rabbi Moshe Waldoks - Temple Beth Zion
Rev. Liz Walker – Roxbury Presbyterian Church
Joanna Ware - Director of Special Projects, Keshet
Rev. Gretchen Weis – Murray Unitarian Universalist Church
Rev. Margaret L. Weis – Bell Street Chapel
Rabbi Ora Weiss - Congregation Beth Hatikvah
Rev. Dr. Donald A. Wells - Theologian in Residence, Old South Church, Boston
Rev. Joseph M. White - St Joseph Catholic, Boston
Sr. Ann Whittaker - Sister of Charity of Nazareth
Rev. Elizabeth Williams - Pastor, Wollaston Congregational Church, United Church of Christ
Rev. Jay Williams - Union United Methodist Church, Boston
Rabbi Elaine Zecher - Senior Rabbi, Temple Israel, Boston

* Please note: The institutional listings are for identification purposes only, and do not necessarily represent organizational endorsements. While many other individuals expressed interest at signing on, the list was limited to those in local leadership roles.