Shabbat shalom, everybody. And Happy Pride. It is so wonderful to see so many people here and to know there are more people online, celebrating with us today. We feel your presence.

Last weekend, I was honored to give the sermon at a multifaith Pride gathering in Tuttle Road Park in Cumberland. It was a joyful, beautiful, windy morning with people of all ages. I got to hold up a picture book with pictures of the many names of God as my UCC colleague read it for the kids. We sang words from the Psalms-- “this is the day that the Lord has made! Let us rejoice and be glad in it.” We read Scripture from the book of Bereishit, from Genesis, examining the story of Creation, and then spoke of the beautiful rabbinic tradition of Midrash, specifically those in Bereishit Rabbah who imagine that Adam HaRishon, the first human, had to be something other than male or female, potentially some of both at once, or something altogether different, in order to have had the second human, Chava, pulled from their rib. We discussed the fact that there are sources within Judaism who for 1500 years at least have openly discussed those who live outside of gender and sexual binaries, and beyond simply naming the existence of such people, have sought to figure out how to include all individuals within the Jewish system, instead of immediately turning to exclusion.

It was incredibly reassuring to experience how many positive things our different faith traditions had in common, especially the core commitment to what we in Judaism call Kavod HaBriot, the dignity inherent in all human life. Each faith leader kept coming back to the sacred refrain from Bereishit, that we are all created b’tzelem elohim, in the image of God, no matter our identities.  We talked about the incredible power of that phrase-- btzelem elohim-- and how focusing in on it gives us a tool to help us celebrate the sacred variety in God’s Creation instead of giving way to homophobia, transphobia, racism, antisemitism, sexism, islamophobia, and other prejudices. That phrase reminds us that in the end, we all have so much more in common than what divides us, and that what we have in common is rooted in holiness. None of us is a mistake, and all of us are part of the sanctity of Creation, just as we are.

In that sermon, I used additional quotes from the Creation story in the Torah to drive the message home.   

לֹא־ט֛וֹב הֱי֥וֹת הָֽאָדָ֖ם לְבַדּ֑וֹ

I quoted from Genesis-- it is not good for a person to be alone. This, I said, was a reminder that we are not alone in our fight for justice. We should turn to each other for strength. And we are not alone in our commitment to building a world where nobody is bullied or abused for being who they are. 

We are all

עצם מעצמי ובשר מבשרי

I also quoted from Genesis. We are all made of the same parts, bones and flesh, the same stuff, and we are all connected in a common human experience. We all smile at the laughter of babies. None of us is lesser or worth more than others. 

And it felt wonderful to be able to quote our Torah and our Midrash and our commentators and to demonstrate that those holy words can be read in support of values that are so central to me personally, and to TBE as a community, and to so many Jews around the world. 

It felt wonderful because, at the end of the day, I believe in a God of love, and I want our texts and our tradition to support me in that belief. I believe that it is godly to put as much love as we can out into the universe and into this hurting world. I believe that by committing in an ongoing way to being open and affirming and to standing in support of the LGBTQ+ community, not just in tolerance but in celebration, we are doing God’s work in this world, and honoring the image of God in each other. 

However. Today of all days, as we join together to celebrate Pride, it is important that we acknowledge that being able to quote our texts in support of love and diversity isn’t enough. 

Because frankly, if we wanted to, we could quote our Torah, and our Midrash, and our commentators, and we could find ample words to defend the exact opposite of celebration, pride, welcome, and love. There are a lot of words, sacred words, words that have been invoked for centuries, from Judaism and from many other religions, that have been used to promote not inclusion, not love, and not the beauty of diversity, but rather division and prejudice and, in some situations, lethal action. Sometimes, these are both verses of Scripture, sometimes deeply researched and thought-out statements by knowledgeable leaders-- by rabbis, priests, pastors, teachers, leaders and more-- who have denied the dignity of queer people and other marginalized individuals throughout history, and who continue to do so today. 

In other words, the power of religion and religious text, which we at TBE know can be a uniting force, has also been wielded over and over to harm the LGBTQ+ community and beyond. Some of us know this truth far too personally. Some of us today carry with us the injuries of religious rejection and religious discrimination.   

That’s why, today, we are going to look beyond quoting Scripture and commentators. I want us, today, to look at what we believe, in our hearts, God wants of us; and we are going to recommit ourselves to action, in the name of what we believe, and because of what we believe. 

And this is the part of this sermon where we step into the murky waters of faith, which we don’t always talk about in Jewish spaces. What sort of a God do we believe in? What sort of a God CAN we believe in? Or, more personally:

What sort of a God do YOU believe in? 

Do you believe in a God that makes mistakes?

Do you believe in a God that will send some of us to hell for our identities and for whom we love?

Do you believe in a God that cares for some humans more than others?

Or do you believe in a God of open, unending, deeper-than-comprehension love?

Do you believe in a God of curiosity?

Or maybe something else?

And moreover, how does a person reconcile it if they want to believe in a God of love but they know, at the same time, that the words attributed to that God can simultaneously be used to harm, shame, and bully others just for existing?

How do we reconcile that?

Well, for starters, it can help if we understand the Torah as being something more than direct quotes and the immutable words of God.

Please note that I am not saying that the Torah is not sacred or holy-- far from it. I am pretty much a professional cheerleader for the Torah. I believe deeply that the Torah contains within it Divine messages, and sacred content.   

However, I am also saying that I agree with my teacher Rabbi Brad Artson, who was the Dean of the rabbinical school I attended. Rabbi Artson always said that the Torah, like other sacred writings from other religions, was not simply Divine but rather “Divinely inspired”-- that is to say, the stories in the Torah were passed down from generation to generation, l’dor va’dor, by humans having intense, real spiritual experiences while birthing a new nation, and an unshakeable thread of the Divine got woven into that story. As these stories were transmitted, more and more of humanity got woven into them until, centuries later, they were written down in our scrolls. 

It’s important to note that believing that the Torah is Divinely Inspired doesn’t mean that Scripture is a lie. It just means that both objective truths and subjective truths are woven into the words of these scrolls. 

On the one hand, this framework can be a challenge. It means that while there are verses in the Torah that reflect our human capacity for deep love, learning, creation, and compassion, there are also verses in the Torah that reflect our human desires to compete with others, to dominate others, and our human fear of those who are different from us. 

However, this can also help explain some of the really troubling content of our Torah, including the verses that have been used to hurt the LGBTQ+ community. 

But on the other hand, believing the Torah is a Divinely Inspired text instead of the literal word of God can be very empowering. It means that we get to ask ourselves: Which parts of the Torah reflect that which is of this world, and of our lives, and which parts reflect something beyond-- something greater than us-- something we can aim for, strive for, hope for, be inspired by, maybe even pray for? Something that isn’t just physical, or empirically measured, but something we can believe in?

Where is that sacred thread of the Divine, we get to ask ourselves, woven through the religion and culture that we, as humans, have built-- and what does it tell us about what God wants from us? What do we believe God wants us to do? 

Like I said before, as Jews, we sometimes don’t talk too much about beliefs and faith, but rather about the wonderful power we have as individuals and communities to, with our actions and our words, help heal the world. There’s a famous Heschel quote that is both beautiful and drives me bananas-- “A Jew is not called on to take a leap of faith. A Jew is called on to take a leap of action.” The reason it drives me bananas is because I think that it creates a false dichotomy. Because what better to inspire our actions, as caring Jews and humans, than whatever we believe? Isn’t our belief system-- whether it’s belief in a better world, or in kindness, or fairness, or equality, or diversity-- isn’t our belief system the thing that shapes the way we act in the world, and how we teach our children to act in the world?

So again, I ask-- what kind of a God do you believe in, in your heart? What kind of a God are you willing to pray to?

For me, as a queer Jew and as a rabbi, the answer is simple. I have to believe in a God of love. I believe in a God that wants love, that roots for love, that wants us to truly and openly and deeply love each other, and that would like nothing more than for humanity and any other life in this universe to make the choice to put in the hard work to learn to place love ahead of discord once and for all. 

I also believe in a God that gave us free will-- and that’s where it gets complicated. More on that in a second.

Frankly, I don’t know how I could be a rabbi if I didn’t believe in a God of love. Because Lord knows I have seen ample evidence in this life of the many ways that humans have hurt each other, and harmed each other, and excluded each other, and judged each other-- and I need to believe in a God that wants us to be better than what we have already demonstrated we can be.   

Back when I lived in DC, I had coffee with a young woman from my synagogue there. She was queer, and she was really struggling with the direction the world seemed to be headed. She had herself experienced so much homophobia, and seen so many attacks on the LGBTQ+ community, so many policies and votes and prejudices and so much fear-mongering, and she told me she wished sometimes that God hadn’t given humans free will. She said that she understood that without freedom of choice, we wouldn’t be human anymore-- we wouldn’t be btzelem elohim anymore-- but at least, then, we also couldn’t hate each other anymore, and hurt each other anymore, not maliciously.

And hearing that hurt my heart. It hurt because it meant that she would rather give up who she was than undergo the torment she was facing. And I refuse to believe in a God that wants anybody to feel like that. 

But her words didn’t make me think less of God. They made me think less of humanity. They were a reminder that in so many ways, humanity has taken the gift of life, and the gift of this world, and the gift of free will and has used those gifts not to bring people closer together, not to put more love in the world, but rather to drive wedges between us. 

It is also a reminder that at the end of the day, by giving us free will, God is demonstrating God’s enormous faith in us, faith that we, too, can one day be godly with our love. It’s like we say at the end of Modeh Ani in the morning-- raba emunatecha-- how great is your faith, O God. 

And we are lucky, here, at TBE, that our community is committed to welcoming all. But it’s not an accident, either-- it is because of sacred action. TBE is an intentionally built community that wrestles with who we are and that has landed where we are today, as a place that prioritizes love. We are not perfect: we are still learning and we are still growing, and hopefully we always will be. But we are committed to the journey, as your rabbi, I want you to know that I am committed to making it with you.     

And that’s a journey that is ongoing. Because, if we believe that we are responsible for one another, then as children of God and members of an ancient religion, we are also, to an extent, responsible for harm that has been done in our religion’s name, and in God’s name. Because as much as I believe in a God of love, I also believe in a God of teshuvah and responsibility.   

Because as much as the quote from Heschel drives me bananas, he’s also right. He’s right that sacred action is an unavoidable requirement of the Jewish tradition. He’s right that all the belief and all the good intention and all the catchy Scripture in the world doesn’t mean a thing if we don’t go out there and try to actively bend the arc of history towards justice. 

The Talmud tells a story of Rabbi Tarfon and Rabbi Akiva lounging together and arguing about which was greater: Torah study, or action. Rabbi Tarfon answered and said: Action is greater. Rabbi Akiva answered and said: Study is greater. Then everyone discussed and agreed, Torah Study is only greater if it leads to action.

The whole point of the mitzvot in our Torah, the whole point of justice, justice, you shall pursue, is that redemption doesn’t come from stagnancy. Redemption doesn’t come from waiting. Justice doesn’t come from avoidance. We need to act. 

We need faith in a God of love, and then we need to act on that faith.

And the first step towards both is being in community, here, today, whether in person or online. Being here, together, and affirming that of the many spiritual paths we could be taking, and the many types of a God we could believe in, we reject division, and we choose Celebration. We choose diversity. We choose affirmation. We choose Pride. We choose each other. And, we believe in a God that wants us to love, and love out loud. 

And then, today, this Pride Shabbat, we are going to take it a step further.

Following services today, we will have the opportunity to step out of this space, together, and going out in public, and joining with our neighbors and saying, together, that we believe in a God of love. That v’ahavta l’reicha camocha, love your neighbor as yourself, means that we will love ALL of our neighbors, just as they are.   

That we will not sit back quietly while others use religion as a tool to harm or to divide us. 

We will show, today and tomorrow and the day after that, that we have faith in love

And we are resolved to act in love

And that we believe in a God of love.

Shabbat shalom