Sermon given August 8, 2026.

Shabbat Shalom, everybody.

As you know, this coming week (God willing!) Ian and I will be getting married. That means that I’ve been running around asking everyone who is married what advice you have for us as we embark on this journey. 

It also just so happens that I have a tendency to turn to the Torah and see what advice it has for what I’m going through in life– I know, I know, I’m a rabbinic nerd– but this is a pretty hilarious week to look for marriage advice form the Torah. Because this week’s Torah portion begins with the following line:

רְאֵ֗ה אָנֹכִ֛י נֹתֵ֥ן לִפְנֵיכֶ֖ם הַיּ֑וֹם בְּרָכָ֖ה וּקְלָלָֽה׃

“Behold, today I set before you a blessing and a curse…”

We laugh, but of course, we all know that with so many things in life– relationships, jobs, projects, ideas, goals, you name it– the reality of it is that sometimes things feel more like a blessing, and sometimes things feel more like a curse.

This is even true of being a rabbi. 

The vast majority of the time, being a rabbi is quite literally the greatest blessing of my life, in that it allows me to actively make my life a blessing to others and to this world, and helps me help others make their lives a blessing. I get the honor of officiating at weddings and b’nai mitzvah and giving sermons and sitting with all of you when you wrestle with big decisions, illness, and life transitions. This tradition blesses me every day, and the fact that I get to be a professional Jew provides me with the framework for putting my beliefs and values into actions each day, and trying to go out and spread blessing to others. So I am always grateful for this path, even when it isn’t easy. 

But just like the dichotomy of blessing and curse offered by this week’s Torah portion, the rabbinate also has times that are not easy– And the last few weeks haven’t been easy. As I discussed in last week’s sermon, serving a diverse congregation has its own unique challenges built into it. There are times when there is no choice that a person can make– and I say a person here, and not just myself, because this is true of all of us at some point– sometimes, there is no choice a person can make that will end well, or that will result in smooth sailing or in unanimous support or understanding. 

 בעולם הזה הם ברכה וקללה

Says the Da’at Zkenim– in this world, it’s inevitable that there will be both blessing and curse. 

The framework of a blessing and a curse is also accurate for describing what it can feel like to be in community with other people. Because as we all know, being in community– any community– brings with it immense benefits, AND it also brings with it friction, infighting, misunderstandings, accusations, division, and feuds. And the more people join that community, and the more varied and rich become the opinions within the community, the more challenging it will be to make decisions for that community that everyone agrees with, or even can just live with. There may be times when community members, and especially leaders tasked with making decisions, can feel “damned if I do, damned if I don’t.”   

When I’ve sat with that feeling in my own life, my brain has reframed the phrase. Instead of “damned if I do, damned if I don’t”, what I’ve realized is that those situations, where I feel that tension– where I feel like all options are curses, and none of them are blessings– are the ones where my various deeply held personal values come into conflict with one another.

You know what I mean? The sort of situations where “follow your heart” or “listen to your gut” just don’t quite cut it, because your gut, and your heart, are actually telling you a bunch of different things. 

I can stand up here and quote Scripture and say, justice, justice, you shall pursue– but what if in different moments, my own sense of the word “justice” means different things? What if doing what I believe is “just” for one person, or one group, feels unjust for another group I care about?

I can stand up here and say “I support the diversity of this synagogue”, but what does that really mean when the decisions I make will land VERY differently with different groups within this community, and any decision I make will hurt someone, or at least one of those groups?

Like our Torah says– I set before you a blessing, and a curse. I believe that carrying the mantle of leadership, sometimes, means being the one to carry the burden of both sides of that coin. 

But what has become more and more clear this week is that it’s important we not lose sight of the blessing within the curse– or to use more specific words applicable to our lives and community, we can’t lose sight of the beauty that exists within productive conflict. That is to say– sometimes, what feels like a curse can actually be a blessing.

Some communities have given up on trying to wrestle with the multiplicity of views and preferences among members, instead adopting one mentality and becoming monoliths to one mindset or another. This situation avoids conflict, but at a cost. Belonging to such a community often ends up with de-facto litmus tests for belonging– either you do, or don’t, use a certain word (say, genocide)-- you do, or don’t, identify as a certain thing– say, zionist or antizionist– and those whose truth is in the gray space struggle to know where they can fit in. 

But I do not want TBE to be a shul like that, and neither do many TBE-ers. As I said last week that it was in part TBE’s Social Kashrut policy that drew me in when I was applying for jobs: the policy written by TBE-ers, celebrating the assertion that there are multiple valid ways to be Jewish. 

In last week’s sermon, I clearly stated that I am honored to be the rabbi of ALL of the Jews of this congregation, both those who refer to Israel’s actions in Gaza as genocide and those who do not AND those who refrain from wading into the argument. In other words, I agree with TBE, that there are multiple valid ways to approach this and many other Jewish issues. And the abundance of emails and texts I’ve received this week from all of you have reinforced that truth– there is no shortage of opinion in this congregation. 

Many of the emails thanked me or offered support.

I did, however, get other emails. 

Some were from congregants who were utterly shocked that there are TBE congregants who believe differently than they do. That tells me that we, as leadership, need to do a better job of bringing people together into real and meaningful discussion in this synagogue, and into relationship with viewpoints other than what is immediately comfortable to them. 

There were also emails from congregants who were shocked that there are TBE congregants who agree with them. People who shared that they had felt alone with their views. Similarly, this shows me that we, as synagogue leadership, can do better at connecting community members to one another. 

There were also emails that stated that no matter what message of inclusion my sermon said, it was meaningless or empty when combined with my signature on the JCA’s letter. Which shows me how much this issue matters to Jews of ALL persuasions, and how much people are hurting, and angry, in the face of the utter tragedy of what has happened in Gaza.   

There were emails this week of gratitude, confusion, anger, disappointment, and celebration.

This means that in a very real way, in my inbox this week, I received a whole mountain of blessings and curses. 

And what keep reminding myself, each time a new message comes in, is that no matter whether it seems more like a blessing or a curse, this is actually a false dichotomy.  If we can learn to lean into productive conflict, then no matter what each message said, they were, actually, blessings.

Because these messages all showed engagement.

Because they were continuing the conversation.

Because even the ones that carried deep disappointment, deep anger, deep disconnect, or deep confusion, showed me that people care enough to speak up.

That people haven’t given up on community, even when it continues to disappoint them. 

That people are willing to say something difficult, to a person that they know thinks differently and then ask “can we talk?”

Because the thing that is worse than either blessings or curses is silence.

 This week’s Haftarah offers us another message of consolation from Isaiah. In it, Isaiah offers comfort to a bereaved people. עֲנִיָּ֥ה סֹעֲרָ֖ה לֹ֣א נֻחָ֑מָה

“Despondent, storm-tossed one, one who is not comforted!”

Says Isaiah.

“I will make your foundations of sapphires, your battlements of rubies, your gates of precious stone, your whole encircling wall of gems.” 

And I understand that Isaiah is describing a fortress of safety and riches to our exiled ancestors; I understand that this is an image that was helpful to them, and gave them something to hope for.

But my comfort does not come from battlements and walls, no matter how shiny and sparkly they may be. My comfort comes from breaking down walls; from building windows, doors, and points of connection and entry into community and conversation. As the sages say in the Yerushalmi וּסְיָיגִין סְיָיגָא וְתִרְעִין תְרִיעָה —fences close things in, but doors are openings. 

My comfort comes from Jews making the choice not to close ranks and shut each other out, but rather to listen, and to truly hear each other, and to sit with each others’ truths, and to put our resources into substance, and into the hard work of relationship. 

Because the last thing we want is to start seeing our fellow Jews, our fellow community members, as blessings and curses, themselves. We are all blessings, full stop.   

In the coming months, the TBE leadership team will be building on the groundwork being laid right now; the groundwork of meaningful, messy, communicative relationships and learning about ourselves and those around us, specifically about what we have in common, and what we do not. This isn’t as easy as letting conflict slide, but the challenge is already worth it. We invite you to join us, and to continue making your voices known. 

Because the opportunity to grow in real relationship is never a curse, and always a blessing. 

Shabbat shalom.