This past Tuesday evening in Swiss Cottage, behind Waitrose, I joined a clergy gathering to meet Rabbi Jill Jacobs. I try to squeeze these opportunities into my already busy week because they are incredibly inspirational; they remind us of our core purpose when we build community.
Rabbi Jacobs leads the American organisation T’RUAH: the Rabbinic Call for Human Rights, which brings the Torah’s ideals of human dignity, equality and justice to life by empowering rabbis and cantors to be moral voices. They do fantastic work in both the United States and Israel. Indeed, it was T’ruah’s network of leaders that connected and supported so many in Minneapolis during ICE’s random attacks there – delivering food parcels to families afraid to leave their homes and supporting school and neighbourhood communities. It was inspiring for our group of UK rabbis and cantors to consider our own capacity to influence public life for the better.
It was particularly poignant to do so during the week of Parashat Terumah, the portion that begins the building of the mishkan (sanctuary): “Tell the Israelite people to bring me gifts (terumah); you shall accept gifts for me from every person whose heart is willing… And let them make me a sanctuary that I may dwell among them.”
I love this verse especially. God dwells among the people, not in the building. Community is created by all of us contributing what we have, what we do and what we can bring.
I have talked about this a great deal in relation to our congregation at FPS, who we are and what kind of community we want to be: kind, principled, learning, curious. You can add the adjectives. But this also reminds us that being part of a Jewish community means keeping an eye on public life and making a difference. I write this as I wait for guests to arrive for the final night of our Winter Homeless Shelter. I know what a difference we have made by hosting these past two months. We have worked with refugees settling here, those seeking asylum and with food banks that support so many, all while looking after the lonely and bereaved within our own community. There are many other just, kind and principled initiatives that our members undertake because of, and on behalf of, us at FPS. I am thinking of all of that this week.
Rabbi Jacobs once wrote of the T’ruah community, “Jews who exercised their commitments to public life outside of the Jewish community will find a place within this community, as they contribute their own wisdom and observations to the conversation [of justice]… .”
May it be so for us.
Shabbat Shalom,
Rebecca
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