Blog

In his first inaugural speech on Saturday, March 4, 1933(The Twentieth Amendment moved the beginning and ending term from March 4 to January 20, and was adopted on January 23, 1933), FDR offered what has become a timeless quote. One of the first lines was: So, first of all, let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is…fear itself - nameless, unreasoning, unjustified...Read more...

I’m not one for New Year’s resolutions. They are usually of the nice yet insignificant type: I’ll try to exercise more; I’ll lose x pounds; I’ll eat more fruit, vegetables and grains. We begin them in earnest and watch them, not our pounds, slowly dissolve. If anything, I’m more inclined to focus on the month of self-evaluation from Elul, the final month of the year, and think about the ways that I have become a better person...Read more...

While the words of the Four Questions might seem out of place for Chanukah, I believe that they are not this year. Let me start first with something good. We have been using technology to simultaneously light the Chanukiyah with our family in New Jersey, and it is such a joy to be a part of our granddaughter’s first Chanukah. One congregant earlier this year had remarked with a smile on his...Read more...

What is the right way, and perhaps the best way, to remember 10.27? I do not think that I could offer one simple answer, as there are many ways to do so. I had the privilege this past Saturday evening of experiencing one of them. The PSO (Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra) is world-renowned, under the baton of Maestro Manfred Honeck. Thirty days after the shooting, on November 27, 2023, the PSO put...Read more...

When I’m purchasing something in a market, a label not only directs me to the item that I am in need of, but also provides information to compare products. In this example labels are useful and necessary. Then there are the labels that are applied to our fellow human beings, whether they are supplied by others or self-applied. One’s political leaning, religion, sexual orientation, family’s...Read more...