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I am grateful that BAJC is able to weave the many strands of Jewish belief into a coat of many colors. We are a little Orthodox, a little Conservative, a little Reform, a little Reconstructionist, a little Renewal. They say that many roads lead to Rome. I am sure far more lead to BAJC. We hear individual stories of people’s roads to Judaism during Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur and more often at potlucks, services and other events. Growing up, I was involved in a Conservative synagogue, with an Orthodox shul across the street and a Reform temple nearby. I cannot recall a single joint event wherein the congregants of one mingled with the congregants of the other. In BAJC, we somehow manage to get it all under one roof (and for years here that has been a Unitarian roof). I am grateful for that, as I am also grateful for the wonderful relationships we are building with the interfaith communities of greater Brattleboro. I am grateful that the ratio of singing to speaking (or mumbling) is greatly skewed toward singing. I have found that many tunes that I thought were only known to the Berch/Lewis/Glaser/Sussan families or to the particular synagogue my family goes to are actually universal.
Why am I grateful to set up and then take down hundreds of chairs, wheeling them on carts with obstinate wheels? Or push a top-heavy Ark up and down an unreliable ramp? Or roll out carts of books from a dark storage room? Or carry really heavy risers to create as bima? Because it is a wonderful “problem” to figure how to accommodate all the friends, neighbors and strangers among us who wish to join us for events. I am grateful to each person who has stopped by, even for a moment; who has attended even one service or event; who has called with a problem or a question or a request. What I am grateful for most of all is to be surrounded by this diverse group of interested, witty, argumentative, humorous, serious, and caring people. And this is my gentle pitch: join as a member and be active as a volunteer. To hesitate to volunteer is to risk not having the chance to share and grow with some truly wonderful people as part of a unique congregation. As Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel writes, “the heart is revealed in the deeds.” I am surrounded by great deeds, and the hearts that give rise to them. I am grateful.
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