Our Future Depends on Us - Remarks at Temple Israel's Annual Dinner Dance

I’m looking out at everyone in this beautiful ballroom with all of the tables set up so magnificently and I have an idea for a little makeover for Rosh Hashanah services.   So bear with me for a moment.

Instead of all those prayers we say before most people get here, we’ll start with a nice cocktail hour, you mingle, wish people a good new year, apologize to people you might have offended.  Then we proceed to our tables, say a few prayers, sit down for the salad course.   And so on.  You get the idea.  We’ll have an early seating and a late seating.

Ladies and gentlemen, tonight is overwhelming.  Deanna and I and our family are overwhelmed with the generous, joyous spirit in this room tonight. 

I’m so grateful to so many people – Rabbi Gerry Skolnik, a rabbi’s rabbi and a wonderful friend, for his profound words, Richie Kestenbaum, for his generous, warm introduction.

The co-chairs for the fantastic dinner-dance – Rhonda and Andrew Bloom, Rachel and Kiu Geula, Elyse and Richie Kestenbaum, the entire dinner dance committee – I’d like to ask the entire dinner dance committee to stand for a moment, please, and be recognized. 

 

I want to acknowledge an enormous debt of gratitude to Rabbi Waxman, alav hashalom, whose vision and dedication were at the core of this congregation for over half a century.

I want to thank Rabbi Fenster, Rabbi Charry and Rabbi Isaac for their mentorship and friendship.  

I deeply appreciate the collegial partnership and friendship that I share with Cantor Frieder.

I’m so lucky to be able to work with Cantor Frieder, Rabbi Adelson, Rabbi Roth, Rachel Mathless, Danny Mishkin and Leon Silverberg – talented, creative colleagues with whom I can dream and collaborate in the awesome tasks of educating future generations and helping to build this sacred community. 

I’m so grateful to our president, Alan Klinger, and the highly dedicated officers of the executive committee, our board of trustees, all of the lay-leaders of our congregation from its establishment to the present who have volunteered talent and time beyond measure.    

I deeply appreciate the many talented, dedicated teachers who work to engage and inspire our children, our phenomenal office staff, our outstanding maintenance staff, our excellent, professional security staff, and I want to thank our caterer for providing a superb dinner for us, once again.  

De and I are so grateful to everyone who came here tonight to celebrate with us, the wonderful members of this congregation who are here and those who couldn’t make it but have been stalwart supporters of our community, those from outside our congregation who have come to celebrate with us, including our sisters and their families.

We’re thrilled to have our children, Josh, Daniel and Zach, here tonight, and so grateful that they regularly bring such joy and meaning to our lives.

And now a word about my co-honoree:

About 26 years ago, Deanna and I had been dating for awhile and I knew she was the right person for me but by temperament I could occasionally over-think things. So I said to my father, I love her. But do I know what love is?  And am I ready?  My dad loved De so much and he said to me, I’m cleaning it up slightly for this occasion, Howard.  Don’t be stupid.  You won’t do better.  You’ll do worse.  

So first of all, all these years later, I want to say thanks, Dad.  Best advice you ever gave me.

My marriage to Deanna has helped me to distill what I feel are the most important qualities in a life-partner – and I hope our children are listening carefully to this part.  They are, in ascending order, Chochma and chesed.  Wisdom and kindness.  De has both in abundance.  And, incidentally, she gets more beautiful every day.

Wonder of wonder, miracle of miracles, God took a not-yet-rabbi by the hand and introduced him to the right life-partner.  Call it Fate.  Bashert.  Resmat.  

In front of our family and friends, I want to offer to Deanna the words that we quoted on our wedding invitation.  מצאתי את שאהבה נפשי Matzati et she’ahava nafshee.  I’ve found the love of my soul.

Now I’m going to share one of my favorite stories, which many of us no doubt have heard, and then I’ll conclude, so we can continue this celebration.

Jonny wants to impress his classroom friends by outsmarting his teacher.  He takes a rock, covers it with his hands, walks to the front of the room and says to his teacher, “you’ll never guess what I’m holding in my hands.”  The teacher thinks and says, “Jonny, you’re holding a rock in your hands.”  Jonny is surprised, as are his friends.  He says to them, I’ll try again.  Takes a flower, covers it with his hands, says to the teacher, “this time you’ll never guess what I’m holding in my hands.”  The teacher thinks and says, “Jonny, you’re holding a flower in your hands.”

Jonny goes back to his friends, thinks a bit, and comes up with a plan.  During recess, he catches a butterfly.  He says to his friends, I’ll go up to our teacher and ask him what I’m holding and he’ll probably guess correctly because he got the first two right.  But then I’ll ask him a second question.  Is the butterfly alive or dead?  If he says it’s dead, I’ll release the butterfly.  If he says it’s alive, I’ll crush the butterfly.  Either way, he’ll be wrong.

So after recess, he walks to the front of the room, covering the butterfly in his hands and says, “you’ll never guess what I’m holding in my hands.”  The teacher doesn’t even take time to think.  He says, “Jonny, you have a butterfly between your hands.”

And Jonny, feeling like victory is close at hand, asks, “is it alive or dead?”

And the teacher pauses for a minute.  Looks Jonny right in the eye and says:  “That, Jonny, depends on you.”

So much as been written about the current state of affairs in the Jewish community.  Frankly, I’m a little exhausted from all the surveys and responses analyzing and often bemoaning the trajectory of American Judaism in general and Conservative Judaism in particular.  

Because when all is said and done, our relevance and vibrancy, now as always, depends on us.  On our efforts, working together, to find creative ways to engage us with each other and with our tradition.

For decades, our congregation has met the opportunities and challenges of American Jewish life with vision and courage.

We’ve engaged each other through the vast range of programs, social groups, religious services and educational ventures that we offer.

Together, we have encouraged more people, men and women, to lead services, talked with parents about Jewish parenting, helped our children feel comfortable and confident with our tradition, begun to embrace the broad cultural diversity that is uniquely ours as a synagogue, tackled complex issues like Israeli politics and the evolving American family, created social affinity groups, brought food and clothing to homeless people, celebrated adult b’nei mitzvah, learned Torah in people’s homes, commemorated 9/11 each year on the Saddle Rock Memorial Bridge, brought multiple Jewish cultural events to our bimah and our local park and I could go on.

And we have continued to be a place where we celebrate life’s joys together and console each other during life’s difficult times.  

When we have worked hard to make sure something succeeds, generally we’ve succeeded.  The outcome has always depended on us – our vision, our effort.

And in 2013, with new challenges and new opportunities, the outcome still depends on us.  And I am so confident in the creativity and dedication of all of us here that I will wager that our future will be extremely bright.  

Deanna and I hold out our hands to each of you.  Unlike the hands of the boy in the story, our hands are open.  I hope that all of us will likewise continue to extend our hands to one another.

Let’s continue to pray, teach, learn, build, support and celebrate – together.  ה׳ עז לעמו יתן Adonai oz l’amo yiten.  May God continue to give us the strength for many years to come.   

Originally delivered at the Annual Dinner Dance of Temple Israel of Great Neck on Saturday, December 7, 2013