Yom Kippur 5766 (2005): Politics

This is not a political sermon, but I want to talk politics.  Here’s what I mean.  I don’t want to tell you who or what to vote for in the next election.  I do want to discuss how we use the collective power of our congregation to guide our actions in the public arena.  Clergy all over the country have been and will continue to politicize the pulpit in an effort to promote particular political campaigns, urging congregants to support their own personal ideologies.  This is what we see happening on the Christian right and most of us don’t like it one bit.  In an effort to distance ourselves from this phenomenon, many people have run from the idea that our religious tradition does have something to teach us about what is means to work for a just society.  We should not be afraid to discuss issues that affect members of our community, especially when Judaism offers us guidance on how to navigate the matter at hand.

When I looked up the word politics in the dictionary I found this definition.   Politics is “social relations involving authority or power.”  In the words of Ernesto Cortes, “True politics is not about polls, focus groups, and television ads. It is about engaging in public discourse and initiating collective action guided by that discourse… Politics is about relationships that enable people to disagree, argue, interrupt, confront, and negotiate, and, through this process of conversation and debate, to forge a consensus or compromise that makes it possible for them to act. [1]   The discourse Cortes is talking about is the sharing of our sacred stories.  And the information we learn from these stories leads us to take political action as a synagogue community. 

We look to the prophets for our guidance in why we choose to act in religious community.  Today’s Haftarah portion is a brilliant example of the politics I’m concerned about.  In this section of Isaiah, which will be chanted in just a few minutes, God says, “Cry aloud, let your voice resound like a Shofar.  My people seek Me daily and as if they were a nation that does what is right and has not forsaken the teachings of its God.”  Do we as a Jewish community do what is right?  When we live in a county whose population is declining due to the lack of affordable housing, what is our responsibility?  When we hear the stories of why some of our members are leaving the area, because they can’t afford to stay, my mind echoes with these words from Isaiah. The Haftarah continues, “They ask of Me the right way, as though eager for the nearness of God.  When we fast, you say, why do You pay no heed?  Why, when we afflict ourselves do You take no notice?”

And why should the Holy One take notice of us if we move through our lives with concern only for our personal needs?  The message behind this prophetic section is that as a synagogue we are commanded to care, to take action to improve the world. One way to do this is through taking political action together on behalf of ourselves and our fellow members.   

The prophet Isaiah lived in exile, in Babylon during the 6th century BCE.  I can imagine that the Jewish community then and there was somewhat similar to ours.  The socioeconomic profile of the Jewish community was diverse and most of the people lived with a secure sense of freedom.  There were flourishing institutions of Jewish learning and one of the two versions of the Talmud was codified during this period of our history in Babylon.

Just as the Jews in Babylon lived comfortably, we too feel a high degree of security in our country.  In some ways, we are more similar to the Jews of Babylon than our parents were.  And, in this environment we often fail to recognize the needs of our own community.  We fail to respond to the false assumption that all of us share the same economic position.  How many members of this congregation worry about making ends meet, on a regular basis?  How many of our members receive scholarships for their children to attend our religious school?  We must recognize the need in our own community and we must as a synagogue make strong commitments to address this need in a more systematic way.  As a rabbi, I am pleased that we   pray and fast on Yom Kippur, but as Isaiah is telling us we must pay closer attention to our actions. Can you see Isaiah, bursting into the synagogue wild-eyed and angry at the hypocrisy he saw around him, demanding that the people think about what Yom Kippur really means?  Our fasting and praying must lead us to do teshuvah-to change ourselves and our community.

As a Reform synagogue, we have much to be proud of.  The Reform movement has always been a champion of social action, bringing new meaning to the concept of Tikkun Olam, healing the world.  Reform rabbis and synagogues have taken positions on both Jewish and Universal human rights issues, as a champion of civil rights, active in the fight against poverty, concern for conditions of farm workers, and opposition to the Vietnam War. According to Rabbi Richard Levy, many Reform Jews now ask, “Where are the great causes today?”  Levy writes, “The imperative for prophetic struggle is less and less to be found within a mass movement in North American society.” [2] I agree with him.  But I would contend that we must now turn our attention to the pressures our families are experiencing as a result of what is happening to our society. 

On Erev Rosh Hashanah I spoke about the importance of building a relational culture in our congregation.  I stressed the religious imperative of understanding that we are each created in the image of the divine.  And I spoke about the benefits we receive as a result of feeling closer to the people we pray, celebrate and mourn with.  Our community becomes stronger through the work of getting to know each other on a deeper level.

A corollary aspect of this work is the power we are able to build together. Our stories reveal the pressures and concerns we each face in our lives.  As we share our sacred stories, we can build the power and trust which enables us to take political action as a synagogue body.   This is another reason why our synagogue has become part of COPA-communities organized for relational power in action. While COPA is a local organization we are part of a larger national organization.  All over the country, other synagogues, churches and institutions are involved in similar efforts. In 1994, less than a dozen synagogues nationwide belonged to these church-dominated groups. As of a few months ago, according to the Jewish Fund for Justice, a national organization that encourages synagogues to affiliate, 61 synagogues - with membership totaling about 60,000 people - belong to 39 different broad-based community-organizing coalitions like COPA.  An additional 24 Jewish congregations are in the process of deciding whether to join one of these coalitions. On February 13, more than 125 invited participants from across the country gathered in Summit, NJ, for a two day-conference representing the first-ever national gathering of synagogues involved in this form of community organizing.   Kathy & Andrew G. along with myself were involved with the committee that planned this national conference.  This form of community organizing takes place within the realm of our values and our struggles.

Ernie Cortes best describes this political organizing as “getting you to recognize what's in your best interest and getting you to recognize that you have a child, that you have a career and a life to lead, and that there are some things that are obstacles to the quality of your life.”  He writes, “I need to get you to see how you can affect those things through relationships with other people. And it's only going to happen if you engage in some kind of struggle.  We organize people not just around issues, but around their values. The issues fade, and people lose interest in them. But what they really care about remains: family, dignity, justice, and hope. We need power to protect what we value."

I am reminded of a story told about Martin Buber.  When he was young he divided his life into compartments.  He spent his mornings immersed in his spiritual practice.  This time was spent contemplating the religious realm as he understood it.  He saw religious experience as separate from his every-day life.  He had a situation occur that helped him recognize how dangerous this division could be.  He writes, that one afternoon after a morning of religious enthusiasm, he had a visit from an unknown young man.  He explains that since he was still feeling immersed in his religious practice he was not fully present with this young man.  While he did not fail to let the meeting be friendly he was not attentive to the needs of his visitor.  Because of this preoccupation with his religious experience, he was unable to identify the question that was weighing upon the young man’s mind. Later, not long after, he learned from one of this young man’s friends-that the young man was no longer alive.  He found out that the man had come to him with a need to make a decision about a crucial matter in his life.   He writes, “I learned that he had come to me not causally, but borne by destiny, not for a chat but for a decision.”  Through this missed opportunity to help save a life, Buber made the commitment to never see religious practice as separate and cut off from the rest of life.  Buber writes, “when you pray you do not remove yourself from this life of yours but in your praying refer your thought to it.” [3]

         I tell this story about Martin Buber to warn us against what can happen if we see our religious practices as something other than our communal obligations to each other and our power to take political action together.  His message is the same as Isaiah’s. 

It is up to us to identify the problems and bring them into the public realm.  Instead of each of our member families dealing with pressures in private, we as a community are asked to see this as part of how we define religion. And politics.  And if we don’t do this, issues of poverty and homelessness become how we judge a person’s character.  Henry Giroux, a columnist with Tikkun magazine, writes these words, “Individuals are told that the misery they feel is a personal flaw that they must bear in isolation…misfortune is viewed as a private disgrace that deserves only a sneer.  A democratic (small d) politics may take many forms, but central to it is the need for individuals, groups, and social movements to be able to translate individual problems into public concerns”. [4]  After we identify the needs of our community, through our house meetings and conversations, we must take the next step of building power and acting in public.  In organizing terms, I have heard power defined as “two people with a plan”.

The theologian Karl Rahner said that power is from creation and from God, and that power can be either good or bad — it is how we use it that is crucial, not the mere existence of power. Power and love have to be combined, as love without power leads to sentimentality, power without love leads to tyranny but power with love leads to justice.

After a long period of gathering stories about the crisis of affordable housing from members in our synagogue and other COPA institutions, building relationships with representatives from the County Board of Supervisors and meetings with the planning department and developers, we took the next step towards building power and acting in public on June 23rd.  That Thursday evening, our congregation hosted COPA’s first housing assembly to discuss the Par 3 housing development. 

We had been working since February 2004, to advocate for affordable housing right in our own backyard.  Working with a private developer, the County planning department, a non-profit housing developer, and elected officials, COPA congregations are advocating for over 200 new units of housing, 40% of which would be affordable for very low income to moderate income families.

COPA boasts the support of 35 area churches, congregations and non-profits. On June 23rd, 260 people from the 18 COPA institutions in Santa Cruz County showed up with petitions signed by over 2,000 members calling for the project to move forward.  Our synagogue was transformed in our own eyes and in the eyes of elected officials, the developers, and the other members of COPA institutions.  We added a new chapter to the Temple Beth El story, which included the individual stories we had gathered over time.  And we took action together to change the housing situation in this county.  While many steps came before this housing assembly and many steps lay ahead, we are on our way towards having an impact upon a problem that affects us as individuals and as the Temple Beth El community.  This is what it means to respond to Isaiah’s challenge.

I urge you to attend our COPA meeting at 5:15 this afternoon to help us plan house meetings during the week of sukkot. You will also find sign up sheets in the lobby for the different house meeting we are planning for October 23rd.  Together, we will identify our community’s needs, build relationships and the power that help us act together and fulfill Isaiah’s charge. 

Here is the promise that Isaiah makes when we respond to his prophecy.  Towards the end of his message, we read, “If you put yourself out for the hungry, and satisfy the needs of the afflicted; then your light will shine in the darkness, and your night become bright as noon; the Eternal will guide you always, filling your throat in parched lands, and renewing your body’s strength.  You shall be like a garden overflowing with water, like a spring that never fails.  Some of you shall rebuild the ancient ruins, rebuilding the foundations of ages past.  You shall be called “Repairer of the breach, restorer of streets to dwell in”.  We earn this honorable title ‘Repairer of the Breach’  through acting together as a community.

The end of Isaiah’s message has an interesting twist.  After Isaiah describes the acts of social justice God demands of us, we expect that the result of taking these actions would be an improved situation for the poor and oppressed.  But instead, the prophet promises rewards to all of us. 

 Our synagogue has the potential to become a watered garden.  We can fulfill Isaiah’s prophecy and become the healer of the breach in our community.  Through sharing our stories and identifying our member’s parched lands, the private pressures each one bears alone and the ancient ruins of what we have lost, we can begin the process of gathering the light of the Divine reflected in the space between us, so that it shines in the darkest of places. 

May our fasting and our prayers inspire us to act together so that we can fulfill this prophecy.  As we gather in house meetings during sukkot or participate in one to one relational meetings may we hold fast to Isaiah’s vision.

1. Cortes, Ernesto “The Politics of Philo: Political Friendship”

2. Levy, Richard A Vision of Holiness The Future of Reform Judaism URJ Press, 2005; p. 170

3. Buber, Martin Between Man and Man p. 13

4. Giroux, Henry “Tikkun Magazine” Volume 20. No.5  p. 46

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