<![CDATA[Kadima Reconstructionist Community - Blog]]>Tue, 08 Sep 2026 13:44:03 -0700Weebly<![CDATA[What are you not facing?]]>Fri, 04 Sep 2026 16:35:28 GMThttps://www.kadima.org/blog/what-are-you-not-facingI am perpetually not facing grief.

Grief for so many things. For the state of the world, mostly. For the loss of friends and family. For the loss of friends’ and family’s ability to remember the loss of other friends and family. For the countless intractable arguments that seem rooted in not actually understanding the root of the problem. For a body and a mind that are attacked because of their differences, sometimes in the name of “what’s good for me.” For limitations and hoarded resources by some that keep abundance away from us all. For greed. And for not being more compassionate toward the people who are letting greed win. And for not being more fierce and demanding toward the people who are letting greed win.

Facing these things would be exhausting. Just writing them makes me tired and want to crawl up into a ball on my bed. It takes most of my energy to attempt to live a healthy day that includes doing the work-for-money thing while caring for the others in my household as well as myself. That’s most of my spoons right there.

This week, I made eggplant parmesan for my cohousing community. I really wanted to eat it this year and thought, well, I’m not going to rely on anyone else to do it for me. And while It. Was. Delicious., it left me spent-and-a-half, and without the patience and strength later that same day to hang in there with a worried young one who was about to start middle school.

Thank G-d for my partner and wife. Thank G-d for the people that support us in getting what needs done when we cannot do them.

See, as I think you can hear in my writing: I am not only not facing grief, but how could I face it?

And this interwove with this week’s Torah portion for me.

This week’s reading is so rich with quotable and oft-quoted lines throughout our tradition and beyond it. We have the powerful obligation to “choose life.” We have the seasonally relevant “return until your G-d,” rich with openness for theological interpretation. We have the often-needed advice from Moshe to not only Joshua, but the entire People of Israel before his departure from the community: “be strong and bold.”

But the section that caught me in a new way this year—as it is so easily associated with a quintessential story in the Talmud—is Deuteronomy 30:11–14 (my translation):
    “For this mitzvah that I command you [m’tzv’cha] today is not too wondrous/hard for you, nor is it distant. It is not in heaven, that you should say, ‘Who will go up for us to the heavens and take it for us and cause us to heed it and cause us to do it?’ It is not across the sea, that you should say, ‘Who will cross for us, across the sea, and will take it for us and cause us to heed it and cause us to do it?’ For the matter is very close to you: it is in your mouth and in your heart, to do it.”

I hear at least two ways to read this.

The first is gentler. It understands that the work of doing a thing depends, at least in part, on whether people have actually been given access to do it. It means the ramps must be sturdy. The quiet rooms must be truly quiet. The childcare must be fun and stable. The chairs must clearly hold our weight. The thing I need must be close enough that I can actually reach it. And, if help or accommodation is needed, ask earnestly: Yes, who will help make this more possible for me?

The second is more urgent: Dude! It’s not that hard! And it’s not that far off! And surely no one else is going to do it for you?! Do it now.

I actually understand a time and a place for both these readings (and others!). As we will read during Sukkot in Kohelet, and from the immortal voice of Dolly Parton: to everything there is a season. (I know it is a Byrds song, but she covered it so beautifully.)

Upon reflection, I have come to understand that sometimes during my time at Kadima I have acted in accordance with one reading when I should have been acting in accordance with the other.

I have come to understand that I was urgent and impatient at times when moving slowly, asking earnest questions, and supporting access and inclusion in processes was what was called for.

And there have also been times when I have been overly understanding. I was too gentle when what might have served the community better was impatience and urgency – an imploring to do, to make, to act. To practice differently.

Because that is all we have: practice.

In fact, all we can do is practice. Practice becoming the people and community we hope to be. My writing these past weeks – facing what is difficult, making room for grief, turning toward one another, giving and receiving tokhecha, looking for the light in ourselves and others – only becomes real if and when we practice them.

It turns out my high school marching band teacher Mr. Rusnak, z”l, was right: “You practice how you perform, and you perform how you practice.” I always interpreted his words as reminding us that there really is no difference between performance and practice – there is just life. It is all practice.

We have looked at a great deal of practice over these last six weeks. I have introduced ideas, some new and others extremely ancient and well worn. But if they stay on the page, on the screen, as things I enjoyed writing (which I did) or that you enjoyed reading (which many of you have told me you have), then they are quite empty, aren’t they?

They are to be washed away in the sands of the internet, or perhaps left in a vortex when Kadima finally launches a new website (stay tuned!).

So, we have one week left of the seven that lead us from the hatred and destruction of Tisha B’Av to the renewal and return of Rosh HaShanah.

When the shofar is sounded next week, I am less concerned with asking: are we ready? Rabbi Lew z”l has already told us we are not, and we will not be.

No. I am concerned with: What are we practicing as the New Year begins?

We still have a week.

That might not be long enough to establish a habit. But there is plenty of time to practice.

So this week, I invite you to practice what you need to practice. What you want to practice. Once a day. A few times this week. Just once, but with genuine intention (and some systems to support you) to do it again. Something small enough that you can actually do it. Something that matters enough that you will notice when you have done it.

If you have ADHD tendencies like I do, maybe set a timer now and look ahead in your planner and schedule when you will do the thing.

And, if you are now finally up for reading Elul backwards, perhaps start by imagining yourself on Yom Kippur: knowing you might not have finished the work, but you’re damn sure you did not desist from it.

Because it is close.

It is within your reach.

Do it.

May obstacles be lifted, practice be within reach, friends and family and partners be willing to help in ways that they can, and may we understand the purpose of it all, as this section of Torah ends: to do it.

Shabbat shalom, and wishing us all an eventful last week of the Shiva D'Nechemta,
R’ David

PS — Solidarity to our educators and students and families! What a whirlwind of emotions and changes throughout this week. I hold you dear as you may be ready to collapse at the end of a very sudden start to the school year. You are all likely more prepared than the rest of us to face the uncertainty that the High Holiday season insists we consider. Please share your stories and experiences as ripe Torah for this moment, and for us all as we continue to navigate these uncertain times – maybe at Shabbat in the Park tonight or at High Holiday events in the coming (gulp) days.
]]><![CDATA[Arise. Shine.]]>Fri, 28 Aug 2026 18:07:06 GMThttps://www.kadima.org/blog/arise-shineI dedicate my Torah learning this week to the blessed memories of Dolly Parton and Tim Curry who both taught me to be more myself.
_

Last week, I wrote about tokhecha—the Jewish practice of telling one another difficult truths and inviting one another toward repair.

I wrote about the importance of not hiding.

About the courage to say, “This is what I experienced.” About learning to hear, “This thing you did hurt me,” without immediately getting defensive. About constructive confrontation, and about the particular ways our Pacific Northwest and progressive Jewish cultures can sometimes make us very good at avoiding conflict while calling it kindness.

And then I spent much of the weekend reading Alan Morinis’ With Heart in Mind, including a chapter called “Loving Rebukes.”

Well.

There is nothing quite like reading about how to give and receive tokhecha immediately after writing about how we ought to do it.

Morinis' title got me thinking about the difference between being willing to give and receive tokhecha and actually coming to want it.

There is a difference between thinking, Okay, I suppose I should be willing to hear difficult feedback. And thinking, I want people in my life who will tell me what I cannot see about myself. The second is much harder. And, perhaps, much more powerful.

Today is Friday, the 15th of Elul. We are moving steadily toward Rosh HaShanah. Toward the rest of our lives, as we now have the power to align and realign them.

And our haftarah this week begins with a beautiful invitation:

קוּמִי אוֹרִי כִּי בָא אוֹרֵךְ וּכְבוֹד יְהוָה עָלַיִךְ זָרָח׃
Kumi ori, ki va orech; u'khvod Adonai alayikh zarach.
Arise, shine, for your light has come; the glory of Adonai has risen upon you.

If that line sounds familiar, it may be because it is referred to every Friday night in the second half of L'cha Dodi: Ki va orech, kumi ori – your light has come; arise, shine – and then in the same stanza: kvod Adonai alayikh niglah – the glory of Adonai has is revealed upon you.

The clear easter egg (let me know if you have a non-Christian hegemonic way of describing a hidden reference) in Lcha Dodi to Isaiah 60, and therefore this entire season (and this entire season to Lcha Dodi and therefore every shabbat) is rich, clever, and quite powerful. It is just one example of the concept of sh’ein mukdam u’me’uchar baTorah – there is no before and no after in the Torah, and, even more broadly, all of Jewish time and practice.

The Jewish calendar keeps giving us opportunities to practice.

Every week, Shabbat asks us to stop and to notice where we are. To let go of some of what we have been carrying. To remember who we want to be. And to reconnect—with ourselves, with one another, with the rhythms of the world, and with whatever we understand as d/Divine.

Perhaps L'cha Dodi is one small way we practice Kumi ori: not waiting until everything is resolved before we allow ourselves to encounter light.

Because Isaiah immediately complicates that beautiful opening verse telling us that darkness shall cover the earth in the very next line of the haftarah.

The light does not arrive because the darkness has disappeared. The light arrives in the midst of it.

And this connected to “Loving Rebukes” for me. The teaching is not simply that we should become better at giving rebuke in loving ways. It is also about becoming the kind of person who can come to want tokhechah. I can recognize that even difficult words may contain something I desperately need to hear. I can learn to love it.

That is a much harder practice because, of course, not every rebuke is true. Sometimes someone else's criticism tells us more about them than it does about us. Sometimes people project their own wounds, fears, expectations, or desires onto us. Sometimes what someone calls tokhechah is simply anger. Sometimes it is even an attempt at control over more than at relationship with.

We need discernment.

But sometimes someone is telling us something we need to hear. And if our first response is always defensiveness, we may never find out which is which.

So perhaps the Elul practice is simply to pause and ask: Is there something here for me? Not: Are they right about everything? Nor: Did they say it perfectly?

Just: Is there something here for me?

And if there is, Loving Rebuke suggests that we can become grateful for the opportunity to see what we could not see before.

We might become better at bringing our best selves into alignment with our highest purposes.

We might even learn to see the light in others when they offer us difficult truths – perhaps especially when they do.

That requires humility. It also requires compassion – for ourselves as well as for the person speaking. Because being accountable for harm does not require believing that we are bad people.

We are human beings. We will hurt people. We will be hurt. We will misunderstand one another. We will sometimes get it wrong. And we will sometimes have the opportunity to do something different.

That is teshuvah.

And this week we (re)learn that teshuvah is not a once a year practice. It is a weekly practice all year long. There can be regularity in this for us, and as my neighbor and Kadima member has been telling his kids for years: “Practice makes progress.”

Every Friday night, we can enter Shabbat for all the reasons that pull and push us toward it, thank G-d, but also because we need to breathe, to notice, and to reconnect.

We need to remember that our relationships are more important than whatever arguments, conflicts, annoyances, and disturbances are getting in the way. We need to remember that we are more than the worst thing we have done or the worst thing someone has said about us. And so is that person who might currently feel like a thorn in my side instead of a rose in my view.

This is part of why I have been making an Elul-to-Ne'ilah playlist this year. It keeps changing as I do. Some songs help me grieve. Some help me wake up. Some help me soften. Some make me want to dance. Some remind me that I am not alone. That there is work to be done. Feel free to add the songs that do it for you and we can jam together.

Because eventually the summer will end. The year will end. My time as Kadima's rabbi will end. But we can keep jamming together.

And because there are things in our community that need to be grieved. Things that need repair. Things that need to be said. Things that may need to be forgiven.

There isn't infinite time. But there is still time. And every week, Shabbat comes again.

Kumi ori: Arise. Shine. Not because the darkness is gone. But because it isn't. Because there is light that only you can bring.

The time is always right – Elul, High Holidays, each shabbat, or each week in preparation for Shabbat – to find the light within ourselves and to look for it in others. Tradition says it is there. May there be time long enough to notice it.

Shabbat shalom and continued Shiva d'Nechemta tovah,
R’ David
]]><![CDATA[You are Unable to Hide Yourself]]>Fri, 21 Aug 2026 14:58:42 GMThttps://www.kadima.org/blog/you-are-unable-to-hide-yourselfLast week, as I wrote about Elul, I suggested that we might read the month backward: envisioning the people and community we hope to become, and then working backward to ask what we need to do today to move in that direction.

This week’s Torah portion, Ki Teitzei, gives us another way to think about that practice.

A verse that caught my attention comes at the beginning of chapter 22 of Deuteronomy, as Moshe is relaying laws around finding someone else’s lost animal:

“…so too shall you do with anything that your fellow Israelite loses and you find: you must not remain indifferent.”

The Hebrew for “you must not remain indifferent” intrigued me: לֹא תוּכַל לְהִתְעַלֵּם / Lo tukhal lehit'alem.

In its most literal sense, it means something like: You are not able to conceal yourself.

Translating from the original Hebrew offers more texture. While many translations want this to be about how we feel toward one another, the actual words tell us what not to do, not what to feel.

Do not hide.

But it actually says more: you are not able to hide.

I physically gasped when I realized the full meaning of this.

Gulp.

Here I am. Seen. And fully a part of all that is happening around me.

While this was strangely startling, I also experienced some freedom in imagining this perspective as a truth. Freedom to choose what to do next now that I know hiding is not even possible.

And I think that is part of what this season is asking of us.

The Shiva d'Nechemta, the seven weeks of consolation between Tisha B'Av and Rosh HaShanah, is enacted most visibly through the seven haftarot of consolation. But the Torah readings keep moving along too. As Rabbi Alan Lew z"l writes about this season, the Torah and haftarah are carrying us along related paths toward the Days of Awe.

We are being asked to do two things at once: to practice teshuvah – the sacred art of repair and repentance – and to practice tokhecha – the sacred practice of telling one another difficult truths and inviting one another toward repair.

And, as such, I am making two lists this week.

One is a list of people I need to apologize to.

The other is a list of people I think need to apologize to me.

The first list is uncomfortable, but in some ways it is straightforward. I can do something about it. I can write to someone and say, “I was wrong. I am sorry.” I can ask what repair might look like. I can begin the work of teshuvah.

The second list is harder.

Because the people on it may or may not be thinking about apologizing to me. They may have a completely different understanding of what happened. They may not remember. And even if they are making their own list of people they need to apologize to, I may not be on it.

What then?

Thank G-d for the obligation among our people to do tokhecha.

I first learned about tokhecha long ago, but my excitement about it swelled when I began leading a white men’s group at my rabbinical college.

As a person carrying white male privilege, I came to understand that if I wanted to have meaningful relationships with other white men – and with everyone who isn't a white man, which is to say, everyone – I needed to not only be good at giving tokhecha, I needed to be great at inviting tokhecha and at receiving tokhecha.

And, my G-d, is this easier to write than to do.

I needed to become not only someone who could hear, “This thing you did hurt me,” without getting defensive, but I needed to be someone whom others felt they could freely and, as lovingly as possible, offer that feedback to. I needed to learn that being a good person and having caused harm are not mutually exclusive. And that when I have done hurtful or harmful things, I still deserve a degree of compassion.

As I often do when I want to learn something deeply, I signed up to teach it.

The foundational teaching about tokhecha in Torah comes in Leviticus 19:17, which we will chant together on Yom Kippur:

“You shall not hate your kin in your heart. You shall surely do tokhecha [hokhe’ach tokhi’ach] with your neighbor, and do not bear guilt because of them.”

The obligation to do tokhecha appears right in the middle of a command not to hate someone in your heart.

The Torah seems to understand something about human relationships that can be easily forgotten when we veer toward strong, visceral emotions:

Silence is not always kindness.

Sometimes we avoid difficult conversations because we want to preserve a relationship. Sometimes we avoid them because we are afraid of conflict. Sometimes we tell ourselves that we are “letting it go” when really we are storing it somewhere inside ourselves.

And sometimes we do the opposite: we speak from the heat of anger, saying what needs to be said but in a way that makes it almost impossible for the other person to hear.

Tokhecha asks us to find another way.

Constructive confrontation.

These days, we sometimes use the language of calling in and calling out. I find both useful, because tokhecha can involve some of both.

Calling someone in says: I care enough about our relationship to tell you what I see, and I believe there may be a way through this together.

Calling someone out says: Something harmful is happening. It needs to be named, and it needs to be interrupted and stopped.

Sometimes we have the privilege of choosing between those approaches. Sometimes power, safety, or the seriousness of the harm means we don't.

Jewish tradition does not pretend that every relationship is equal or that every confrontation can be gentle. But where relationship is possible, it repeatedly asks us to pursue accountability without humiliation, and truth without abandoning the possibility of repair.

The rabbis were under no illusion that this was easy.

In Arakhin 16b, Rabbi Tarfon wonders whether anyone in his generation knows how to receive tokhecha. Rabbi Elazar ben Azaria wonders whether anyone knows how to give it.

We are not naturally very good at this. And we maybe haven’t been for centuries.

The Talmud goes even further in Yevamot 65b:

“Just as it is a mitzvah for a person to say something that will be heard, so it is also a mitzvah for a person not to say something that will not be heard.”

Tokhecha is not a license to unload. It is not “I have a right to tell you exactly what I think without regard for you, dear community member.”

It is a practice of constructive confrontation: saying what needs to be said in service of relationship, with enough care and attention that it might actually be heard.

And I think this is particularly important for us in the Pacific Northwest, in progressive communities, and in Jewish communities shaped in part by assimilation into a culture that often prizes politeness above almost everything else.

We have plenty of reasons to push against that.

Politeness is not the same thing as kindness.

Avoiding conflict is not the same thing as preserving relationship.

Jewish tradition does not ask us to be nice. It asks us to be present, responsible, and in relationship.

If doikayt – the Diasporist practice of being fully present where we are, centering the current location of our lives – is part of what we mean when we say Hineni – here I am, ready to do the work – then perhaps there is nowhere else to go. Nowhere to hide.

Unable to hide.

Turns out we may each just be a significant and meaningful part of what has happened, is happening, and what could still happen next.

For Kadima, I think this matters enormously.

If we are truly engaged in Reconstructing Kadima Together, then reconstruction cannot simply mean deciding what structures we want in the future. We have to overcome that which may be unspoken between us. We need to know where we stand with one another in order to know what we need to change.

That requires teshuvah.

And it also requires tokhecha.

It means creating a community where people can say, “This is what I experienced,” without immediately being told that their experience is wrong.

It means being able to hear, “This is how your action affected me,” without assuming ill intent.

It means being willing to say things because we care enough about one another – maybe enough about Kadima too – to try.

And it means being willing to invite feedback as well.

I can make a list of the people I believe I owe an apology to. I can make a list of the people I believe owe me one. But I cannot make someone else do the teshuvah that is theirs to do.

What I can do is decide whether I am willing to open the conversation.

And this is where I am finding myself this week of this Elul: with lists I have made, with messages I have started drafting, and with no guarantee about what will happen when – or if – I send them.

Perhaps that is part of the practice.

Tokhecha is not a perfectly crafted statement in which I get to write both sides of the conversation. It is an opening.

I don't exactly know what will happen when things open up. I don't know whether the other person will understand, agree, apologize, or even want to have the conversation.

But I do know this:

I am not able to hide myself.

Neither are you.

Neither are we.

So perhaps this is our practice for this week: not to fix everything, not to make ourselves ready for Yom Kippur, but simply to become a little more willing to be here – to see, to speak, to listen, and to stay in relationship with what we discover.

And perhaps this is why I am drawn to another teaching from the Talmud that we may return to later this season. In Yoma 86a, Rabbi Chama bar Chanina points to the words of the prophet Hosea: אֶרְפָּא מְשׁוּבָתָם אֹהֲבֵם נְדָבָה / Erpa m’shuvatam; ohaveim n’davah: “I will heal their backsliding; I will love them generously.”

The Hebrew word Hosea uses for backsliding, m’shuvatam, comes from the same root as teshuvah: turning, returning. Even when we have turned the wrong way, the possibility of returning remains. And the response imagined by the prophet is not rejection, but healing and love.

I know that may not be where we are yet. But reading Elul backwards, it is where we could aim to be, as soon as is collectively possible – bimheira b'yameinu.

This week, our work might be to stop hiding. To investigate what is true through courageous and constructive confrontation and through humble and active listening.

Nearly half of these seven weeks are behind us. We cannot hide. Here we are. 

While the bad news might be: we have work to do; the good news is: there is work we can do. May shabbat provide fuel for the work ahead, and may we do the work with imperfection and grace.

Shabbat shalom and continued Shiva d'Nechemta tovah,
R’ David
]]><![CDATA[Reading Elul Backward]]>Fri, 14 Aug 2026 16:44:32 GMThttps://www.kadima.org/blog/reading-elul-backwardA couple of nights ago, the Perseid meteor shower reached its peak. It happened to coincide with the first day of Rosh Chodesh Elul—the 30th of Av, the last day of a month that has carried us through the deep brokenness remembered on Tisha B’Av and toward the consolation, possibility, and love of Tu B’Av.

And now we are on the second day of Rosh Chodesh Elul and the first day of the month of Elul. We are, quite literally, between things.

There is a piece of Jewish wordplay about Elul that I love. Read forward, the month is Elul. Read backward, it becomes lulei—לוּלֵי—which means “if not,” or “had it not been,” from Psalm 124.

I have been thinking about what it means to read Elul backward.

In some ways, that is how I have approached this whole period of transition at Kadima. I started at the end. Once I knew I would be leaving, I could look forward to an envisioned, lovely last day and work backward to each today, mapping a trajectory toward how I hoped things might go. From that vantage point, I could see more clearly what I needed to do next at each step.

Upon reflection, I realized that I learned how to do this long before I knew it was Jewish. When I was a student at the University of Florida, I took a class called Advanced Management with Dr. Michael Schwartz, of blessed memory. I laugh at how simple and how impactful his class was, remembering that his primary textbook was Stephen Covey’s Seven Habits of Highly Effective People.

One exercise he led us in has stayed with me for decades. He asked us to imagine our lives twenty years in the future. What would a life well lived look like? Then we worked backward: fifteen years, ten, five. Until finally, he asked:

What will you do this week that puts your life on that trajectory?

I didn’t know it then, but that exercise was part of what eventually led me back into my Jewishness and to Judaism itself, and, almost exactly twenty years later, to rabbinical school.

This is what I think Elul asks us to do: read our lives backward. Not to get stuck in the past, but to let the life we hope to have lived clarify what we do now.

Rambam writes in Hilchot Teshuvah that human beings have reshut—the capacity to choose. We are not simply carried along by circumstance or destiny. We have the ability to choose the direction of our lives. Jewish tradition gives us practices throughout Elul to help us remember that.

We hear the shofar.

Not just once, but traditionally almost every day of Elul, and then on Rosh HaShanah and Yom Kippur.

The shofar interrupts ordinary life and asks us to wake up.

In Sephardi communities, selichot—prayers of repentance and forgiveness—begin at the beginning of Elul, sometimes in the middle of the night or very early in the morning. The tradition is not simply telling us that we have something to regret. It is asking us to get up and pay attention.

Teshuvah is not just regret. Teshuvah is the possibility of resetting a trajectory.

We may or may not be ready to wake up. After all, the world is terribly hard. Horrible, terrible things have happened that leave unhealed, stubborn wounds. Horrible, terrible things are happening right now. There are good reasons to not want to wake up yet.

That’s okay.

Elul is an invitation—an open invitation to an open house—not a mandate to perform spiritual readiness, now, now, now. Come when you truly can, and stay as long as you’re able. And if you choose not to come yet, we will miss you and be lacking because of it. We will want to know why you were unable to come, so that anything we can do to make it more welcoming, more accessible, more cozy, we will do.

But know that it may not be perfect. It may not be just right. It may be hard. It will likely involve some work.

Thank G-d.

Something that has awoken me to the importance and ephemeral nature of this season is the knowledge that something dear to me is ending. There is grief for me in that.

The end of summer. The end of a Jewish year. The end of having “young kids.” The transition of relationships. The end of a chapter of my life. The end of an era for a community I love.

I am leaning into the idea that my grief is an acknowledgement that something has truly mattered to me.

And since the public announcement that I am leaving Kadima was sent, I have felt a surprising freedom in how I lead. At the first in-person gathering I led—this past week’s Shabbat in the Park—I felt completely present. I noticed people I didn’t already know and made a point to connect. I felt prepared. I was, frankly, on my game. I have experienced myself in other work tasks, meetings, and Torah study lately as having more clarity and precision.

Part of what changed is that I know the end is near.

When I stopped imagining that I had an unlimited future in this role, I became more present to the time I actually have. There might not be another opportunity. That has made each conversation, each moment, matter more.

And in a little over five weeks, Yom Kippur will ask us to do something similar. Jewish tradition treats Yom Kippur as a rehearsal for death: fasting, white clothing, vidui, and the repeated confrontation with the question of who we are and how we have spent the time we were given.

The rabbis teach: Repent one day before your death. We don’t know which day that is.

So: today, then.

That isn’t meant to frighten us. It is meant to clarify. The knowledge that we will not be here forever can make us more fully here now.

It has for me in this season.

And perhaps that is the work of Elul. We look backward so that we can see the trajectory. We notice where we have been going. We allow ourselves to grieve what is ending. We envision where we want to go. And then, when we are ready, we choose a next purposeful step knowing it will not take us to a rigid “there.” It will be our wholehearted contribution to the creation of the tomorrow we wish to live in.

That is also part of the work of Reconstructing Kadima, together. We don’t yet know exactly what Kadima will look like five years from now, or ten, or fifty. We don’t need to know. But we can begin by envisioning the community we hope to be and working backward.

The practices we choose now will become the trajectory of the future we collectively create.

We don’t control everything that happens to us. We don’t get to choose the past. We don’t know the future.

But we do have reshut—choice.

We can choose our next step.

So, may I suggest an Elul practice this year that feels true to the Torah of my life at this moment: Start at the end. Work backward. Then come all the way back to now. What present action best sets up your future self to live in that vision?

And if you aren’t ready to do that yet, that’s okay. The shofar will sound again tomorrow.

For the open invitation of Elul has come. Onward.

Shabbat Shalom and Chodesh Elul Tov,
R’ David

PS — An inspiring offering that accompanied me as I wrote this week’s dvar Torah was the brand new Ways of Awe, a fabulous new High Holidays podcast from Kadima’s very own Maia Brown and Shelby Handler. Listen wherever you get your podcasts and save the date for a local community celebration on Saturday, September 19, 7pm at Jack Straw Cultural Center! Shkoy’ach and chazak u’baruch!

PPS — Shabbat in the Park was so fun last week! For the 30ish folks who came, it was so lovely to be with you, your delicious potluck items, and the oys you released and the joys you brought us all into. Here are a few pictures below for your enjoyment. I want to apologize to anyone who had trouble finding us (we were between the playground and the wading pool at some reserved tables). In the office, we have made an effort to ensure that exact park locations get communicated in the future – save the date for Elul Havdallah on 8/22 in Woodland Park and a bonus Shabbat in the Park on 9/4 in Volunteer Park!

]]><![CDATA[Holding Many Truths]]>Fri, 07 Aug 2026 18:44:12 GMThttps://www.kadima.org/blog/holding-many-truthsLast week I wrote about the beginning of the Shiva d'Nechemta—the Seven Weeks of Consolation that carry us from Tisha B'Av to Rosh HaShanah. Jewish tradition doesn't ask us to move from grief to renewal overnight. Instead, it gives us seven weeks to practice becoming the people we hope to be when we stand together on Yom Kippur.

With a week of reflection, I am thinking of that piece as the first in a series of seven taking us through the Days of Awe. I hope we can spend these seven weeks together in learning and practice, synchronously and asynchronously.

While I don't know exactly where each reflection will lead – these are not prewritten and released weekly – I do know where I hope we will go together: toward deeper honesty, greater compassion, and a community more capable of repairing what has been strained within ourselves, between one another, in the fabric of our Kadima community, and in the world we share.

This week I've been struck by the strange emotional landscape of August already.

Seattle is beautiful this time of year. Lingering outside after dinner. Watching the tomatoes and eggplant ripen. Gathering for Shabbat in backyards and parks. Playing with (or near) our young people later and longer with family, with neighbors, and at camp. There is something expansive and joy-inviting about these long summer days.

And yet.

The violence in the West Bank continues unabated. A shooting at Seattle Center has shaken our city. Wildfires are burning across Washington, and while many of us west of the Cascades are seeing hazier skies, our neighbors to the east – including the Jewish community in Spokane – are experiencing the fear and devastation they bring. 

How can the world be so beautiful and so broken at the same time?

Jewish tradition rarely asks us to choose one reality over another. Instead, it invites us to become people whose hearts can hold many truths.

And that is perhaps where the teshuvah process begins.

Many of us think of teshuvah as repentance, or feeling sorry for something we've done. Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg, in her wonderful book On Repentance and Repair, which I am relistening to this season, reminds us that our Jewish ancestors imagined something much richer. Teshuvah is not simply feeling bad. It is telling the truth. It is acknowledging harm, taking responsibility, making repair where possible, and becoming someone less likely to cause that harm again.

Importantly, she also reminds us that teshuvah is not only personal. Institutions can – and must – practice teshuvah, as well.

Congregations can and must.

Boards can and must.

Communities and individuals can and must.

That has stayed with me as the board continues its work of Reconstructing Kadima.

Every institution makes mistakes. Every community falls short of its aspirations. Ours is no exception. The question is not whether we have missed the mark. The question is whether we can become the kind of people – the kind of community – that tells the truth about ourselves without giving up on us.

There is a passage by the feminist theologian Judith Plaskow that I had the pleasure to learn this week. She writes that the "failure to grapple with the hard parts of tradition is spiritually and socially corrosive...it leaves destructive ideas intact to shape our consciousness and affect our hearts and minds." She goes on to say that "remaining silent about the negative aspects...not only leaves them to do their work in the world, it also deprives us of an important spiritual resource..."

I think the same is true of communities. The conversations we avoid don't disappear. The hurts we never name don't evaporate. Silence is rarely the same thing as peace. If anything, it often allows distance, resentment, and misunderstanding to quietly grow.

That doesn't mean every thought needs to be spoken, or every frustration aired. Judaism does not confuse honesty with impulsiveness. But it does suggest that healing requires a willingness to be present to what is true.

Over these next several weeks, let's spend some time thinking together about two deeply Jewish practices that belong to this season: teshuvah and tokhechah.

Teshuvah is the work of returning and repair.

Tokhechah is the practice of offering loving accountability – caring enough about another person, or about a community, to speak difficult truths in ways that preserve relationship rather than destroy it.

We'll come back to both in the weeks ahead. 

For now, I believe the invitation is simply to soften our hearts. To resist the temptation to rush past discomfort. To notice where we become defensive. To make just a little more room for curiosity.

That is difficult work. It asks something of us. Especially after a hard season. Especially when trust has been tested. Especially when we are tired. Especially when we are busy.

And yet I believe this is exactly what the Jewish calendar is inviting us to practice in these weeks.

Not perfection.

Not agreement.

Presence.

As many of you know, these High Holidays will mark the end of my time as Kadima's rabbi and the beginning of a different relationship with this community as Rabbi Emeritus. Perhaps that is one reason these seven weeks feel especially precious to me. I don't want to simply count down the weeks until Yom Kippur. I want to spend them learning and practicing, together, the habits that I believe will serve Kadima long after any one rabbi, board, or moment in its history.

So this week, my invitation is a simple one.

Enjoy the beauty of this season.

Let it nourish you.

And don't allow that beauty to turn your eyes away from suffering – whether in the wider world, within our own community, or in our own hearts.

Hold it all.

Because I suspect that the same heart that can hold joy and grief at once is also the heart capable of repentance, forgiveness, and repair.

May this week of consolation continue to soften our hearts for the sacred work that lies ahead. And may we find some acceptance and inspiration in the fact that the new year awaits us. And with it promise, possibility, and yes, work to do.

Shabbat shalom and Shiva d'Nechemta tovah (may your seven weeks of consolation be good ones),
R’ David

PS – I hope to see you tonight at Volunteer Park for a Shabbat potluck dinner, at Torah study on Wednesdays at noon, or some other moment of communal gathering soon!

PPS – The primary elections this week brought some good news and some bad news for folks locally and beyond. I really appreciated these words of Torah in the Forward from Rabbi Alana Alpert from T’chiyah, a Michigan based Synagogues Rising community, about the Democratic senate primary there.]]><![CDATA[Becoming a Community of Consolation]]>Fri, 31 Jul 2026 18:40:50 GMThttps://www.kadima.org/blog/becoming-a-community-of-consolationWe have spent the last three weeks of the Jewish calendar remembering destruction.

Not only the destruction of the ancient Temples, but every destruction that echoes through Jewish history and through our own lives. Tisha B'Av reminds us that communities break. Trust breaks. Relationships break. Institutions break. Sometimes because of forces beyond our control. Sometimes because of the ways we fail one another.

Jewish tradition is remarkably honest about this. It never asks us to skip over grief. It never asks us to pretend that loss isn't real.

But this Shabbat, something changes.

This week begins the Shiva d'Nechemta – the Seven Weeks of Consolation. For seven weeks, all the way until Rosh HaShanah, the prophets invite us on a different journey. The first words we hear in this cycle, which began last week’s haftarah reading, are Isaiah's:

נַחֲמוּ נַחֲמוּ עַמִּי
Nachamu, nachamu ami
"Comfort, [yes, please] comfort My people," says God. (Isaiah 40:1)

I've often wondered why there are seven weeks of consolation but only one day of Tisha B'Av. Perhaps because destruction can happen in a day. Reconciliation rarely does.

These seven weeks aren't simply about feeling better. They are about learning how to become people who can rebuild after heartbreak. They invite us to tell the truth about what has happened, to mourn what has been lost, and then to ask what faithfulness requires of us now.

I think our community knows something about that.

The last six months have changed Kadima.

There has been grief. There has been conflict. There has been uncertainty. Some people have drawn closer. Others have stepped back. We have all, in one way or another, been shaped by what has happened among us.

The temptation after a difficult season is either to move on too quickly or to become stuck in it – to replay old hurts, rehearse old arguments, or quietly withdraw from one another. Here in the Pacific Northwest, we often choose another path altogether: we avoid. We tell ourselves that if we don't bring up the difficult conversation, perhaps time will smooth things over on its own.

Jewish tradition imagines something more courageous: Not leaning toward conflict for conflict's sake, but leaning toward one another, sometimes in disagreement, but always in truth. The ability and willingness to stay in difficult conversations a little longer is held up for us to strive toward.

To listen before assuming.

To speak honestly before resentment hardens.

To trust that relationships are strengthened not because conflict never happens, but because we refuse to abandon one another when it does.

The Board has begun a series called “Reconstructing Kadima.” I find that name deeply resonant – not simply because it describes institutional work, but because it names a deeply Jewish practice.

Reconstruction is not pretending nothing broke. It is not nostalgia for what once was. It is gathering the pieces honestly, asking what still carries life, and choosing together what we will build next.

Isaiah later imagines exactly this kind of community in the third to last line of our Yom Kippur haftarah: "Your people shall rebuild the ancient ruins, raising foundations from generation to generation. You shall be called repairers of the breach, restorers of paths to dwell in." (Isaiah 58:12)

Isaiah doesn't say we become people who erase the breach. We become people who repair it. Both the breach and the repair are essential parts of the story.

Kadima has never simply been a building, a budget, or a board. Kadima began in living rooms. It has always been a web of relationships, woven over decades by people willing to show up for one another and for the work of building a Judaism rooted in justice, joy, learning, courage, and compassion.

A web isn't strong because every strand is unbreakable. A web is strong because there are so many connections that when one strand weakens, others hold. And when a strand breaks, someone chooses to weave another.

Perhaps that is our work over these next seven weeks:
To weave.
To reach out to someone we haven't spoken with.
To ask a hard question with genuine curiosity instead of accusation.
To offer an apology.
To receive one.
To stay present when it would be easier to disappear.
To recommit ourselves—not because everything is resolved, but because this community is worth the work.

By the time we arrive at Rosh HaShanah, I don't hope simply that we feel consoled. I hope we will have become a community that knows how to console. A community that has practiced telling the truth with compassion. A community that has practiced remaining connected through disagreement. A community that has remembered that the strength of Kadima has never rested in any one person or any one moment, but in the countless strands of relationship that bind us together.

May these seven weeks become, for all of us, not an escape from what has happened, but a sacred season of reconstruction.

May we have the courage to face what is true, the tenderness to hold one another through it, and the wisdom to rebuild something even more deeply rooted in the values that brought us together in the first place.

Toward repair, and shabbat shalom,
R’ David
]]><![CDATA[Reconstructing Kadima]]>Fri, 24 Jul 2026 07:00:00 GMThttps://www.kadima.org/blog/reconstructing-kadimaReconstructing Kadima will be a new recurring entry to the Kadima newsletter as we have updates. We’ll share news from the Kadima board and task forces to the community. Here’s this week’s news:

Kadima Board
Lots of changes! Three new board members were appointed by the board, with input from the membership. Britt Nave is taking on the secretary role. Katie Harris is the new treasurer. Quinn Schultz has also joined, with particular interest in board accountability and structure. Michael Blum has stepped off the board and we thank him for his service during a challenging time for the community.

The board is also taking inventory of Kadima’s organizational ecosystem, identifying systems and practices that need improvement.


Organizational Improvements
Sarah Edelstein will be taking on staff responsibility for programming as well as the Kadima School. We’re looking forward to our improved programming capacity!

The board has voted to restructure the budget. We will use program-based budgeting to improve the quality of our management information and make Kadima more competitive for grants.

Our new dues structure rolled out July 1st. If you haven’t yet re-upped, we urge you to do so as soon as possible. Your renewal will determine what level of programming and staffing Kadima can offer. Please renew your membership here.


Task Forces
The Member Engagement Task Force wants to connect with you! We’ve had many great check-in calls with members but don’t have the capacity to contact all members. If you’d like a call with one of us, please email Mark at mdepstein1@gmail.com. If you want to help call your neighbors or join us to scheme more member connection opportunities in the Fall, please email Leah at leahlyn52@proton.me. Future goals include more member socials, new member orientations, and revitalizing neighborhood groups.

The Values Task Force is developing a process to elicit from members the values that we want to undergird our community. We’ll have a community discussion on Yom Kippur afternoon, a survey of members, and more. Our community values will shape our policy decisions, program and strategic relationships going forward.


The Programming Task Force is thrilled to be working with Sarah Edelstein as our new Director of Programming, offering Shabbats in the Park and Havdallah this summer. Stay tuned for new ways to offer and vision programming as a Kadima member.

The Financial Task Force is working with the board on how FTF will support Kadima’s financial strategies and decision-making.

Beit Avodah, our ritual and liturgy committee is working with Rabbi David to plan our High Holiday program.
_

If you would like to get involved with any of our Kadima Taskforces, or join the board, please email us at office@kadima.org.

]]><![CDATA[Kadima Board Special Announcement]]>Fri, 17 Jul 2026 18:50:01 GMThttps://www.kadima.org/blog/kadima-board-special-announcementDear Kadima members,

We’re writing to let you know about an important change in the new Jewish year. Rabbi David Basior has decided to transition from his role as Kadima’s Rabbi to Rabbi Emeritus after the High Holidays. We are deeply grateful for his 11 years of service to our community. You can hear directly from him in his letter to our community below.

Rabbi David will continue to co-lead this year’s High Holidays along with Beit Avodah, our ritual and liturgy committee. He will remain a cherished member of our community in his new role as Rabbi Emeritus. Rabbi David will still officiate all planned b’mitzvahs in the upcoming year, and has agreed to contract with Kadima to provide some life cycle support for our community in this interim period.

While the shift is earlier than we had initially expected, it also gives us as a community an opportunity to expand member participation across our organization. Starting in the fall, we will convene an exploration committee to begin the work of charting Kadima’s rabbinic future. Beit Avodah will plan services and consider how our community provides pastoral care during this rabbinic transition.

Sarah Edelstein has agreed to take on staff responsibilities for programming, and the board is excited to deepen its collaboration with our various task forces. Ultimately, this period of rabbinic transition will serve as a reaffirmation of Kadima’s democratic, member-led ethic.

On the topic of democratic renewal, the Kadima Board appointed three new members, Katie Harris, M. Quinn Schultz, and Britt Nave, to the board. This came after members overwhelmingly supported this action in the opinion poll that was sent out. We are excited and thankful for the new board members stepping up to provide their energy, expertise, and leadership.

The board is also tremendously grateful to Hila Keller and Chelsea Alvarez, who recently rotated off the board, for their dedicated service to Kadima. Their leadership and skills were invaluable to keeping our organization afloat as we navigated the choppy waters of the last few years.

Thank you to all the members who have helped in our efforts to ensure long-term financial stability for Kadima. Your attendance in community meetings, participation in the task forces, answers to our surveys, generous donations, email responses, and phone calls have all helped us chart a better course. Your robust participation in the new progressive, income-based membership model would enable us to hire an executive director to grow our organizational capacity and stability.

We are looking forward to continuing to partner with all our community members and ensure everyone is more included in communal decision making.

We are profoundly grateful to Rabbi David for his years of spiritual, ethical, and strategic guidance and his ability to build and nurture our collaborative community. We will savor our time with him during the next few months as we prepare for his pastoral transition to a different role in our community. We send him and his family our best wishes and profound gratitude.

We are confident in the resilience of our community and look forward to building and growing together during this transitional period. If you have not already, please consider joining a task force, and please take a moment to re-register for membership via our new system if you have not done so yet. We look forward to seeing you at High Holiday services!

Please don’t hesitate to contact us with any questions or concerns.

Sincerely,
Kadima Board
Britt, Guy, Katie, Marion, Michael and Quinn

PS: If you wish to reach out to Rabbi David to share a note of gratitude, please write to him at rabbidavid@kadima.org. He will be back in the office at the end of July.

Letter from Rabbi David Basior

Dear Community,

I have loved working at Kadima. Not so long ago someone thanked me for my leadership here, and my response was “It is my pleasure!” The thanker looked at me skeptically, knowing it has been a rocky go of late, and said ”Is it, really?” And, with a smile, I replied: “Yes. It is my pleasure to serve Kadima as its rabbi.”

It has not been a linear eleven years. There have been some very high highs, and also some deeply low lows, with so much in the gray, lovely, complicated in-between. But overall, my time at Kadima has been both largely and profoundly positive for me. My hope is that when you weigh all the ups and downs, you can say something similar about your time in this community. It truly is remarkable.

I am writing to announce that my time as Kadima’s rabbi will come to an end earlier than expected. My last day will be September 25, 2026, just after Yom Kippur 5787.

I had every intention to stay at Kadima through June 2027 to support the community through a rabbinic transition and have time to say goodbye slowly. While the work this spring to stabilize Kadima financially has been tremendous – creative, dedicated, slow, and intentional – it has also been understandably uncertain for the staff and the whole community. While the organization's stabilization work continued this Spring, I sought out other possibilities to create stability for myself and my family. In the midst of it all, I accepted a full-time, year-long residency in hospital chaplaincy at Seattle’s VA Hospital that begins this fall.

The Board and I have worked out arrangements for me to remain Kadima’s Rabbi until just after Yom Kippur, serving for the High Holidays this fall before departing and becoming Kadima’s Rabbi Emeritus. And, as previously agreed, I will still officiate all eight of our currently scheduled youth b’mitzvah services through June 2027 – and I am excited to do so!

I firmly believe Kadima’s future is well held in this community’s hands. Together with the Board, the Financial Task Force has provided a road map to find stability for Kadima, and now our community must grasp and secure it. I believe that a financially stable Kadima can be a Kadima that rebounds far stronger than before, with the possibility of future rabbinic and executive leadership that suits the community’s needs, supports a continued strong youth education program, and amplifies our powerful and important Jewish voice for justice, solidarity, and peace. It will be up to each one of us to ensure this future. I hope you have already experienced the creativity and energy of our newly created task forces and will consider joining one – Member Engagement, Financial, Programming, and Values – or join the Board itself, to be a part of what’s to come.

I hope these next few months can help set the community up for a stable next chapter. Let us celebrate what we have accomplished together, acknowledge where there is still much room for growth, repair what is broken, and enable our collective to move onto what is next with gratitude, humility, and possibility. I hope to see you all at least once before my tenure ends. As you see above, I am staying in Seattle, my family and I will remain members of Kadima, and we look forward to continued support of Kadima's ongoing success.

To moving forward,
R’ David
Thank you from all of us at Kadima for your continued support. If you have questions about R’David’s transition or anything else, please don’t hesitate to reach out to us at office@kadima.org.

We ask that out of respect for R’David’s much deserved vacation that you please refrain from calling him or texting him directly about his transition at this time.

If you would like to reach out to him to share thanks or ask questions, please email him directly at rabbidavid@kadima.org and he will respond to you as he is able, upon his return.

Thank you for your care and understanding!

In gratitude & solidarity,
Kadima Staff & Board
]]><![CDATA[48 Years of Kadima!!!]]>Fri, 10 Jul 2026 17:51:39 GMThttps://www.kadima.org/blog/48-years-of-kadimaYesterday, July 9th, marked Kadima’s 48th anniversary and what we lovingly refer to as Kadima Founders Day. 🎉 And in honor of Founders day, we’d like to share a piece R’David wrote last year (as he is out until the end of July) that speaks to our amazing Kadima History:

Picture
“In the beginning...Jewish radicals created Kadima." (Kadima 1:1)
The year was 1978, and the world was increasing in neo-nazism and authoritarianism, and Jews said "Let there be liberation." And there was liberation.

Beginning as the Jewish Liberation Alliance, Kadima held its first event on July 9th, 1978 as a rally in solidarity with the community of Skokie, IL who was (almost) marched on by nazi party members. About the march on its 40th anniversary, Jewish Currents wrote: "Archival documentation tells a more complex story of massive counter-demonstrations, black and Jewish solidarity, Holocaust survivors who vowed to confront the Nazis in the streets, and a grassroots battle between a small collective of proud, leftist Jews and the conservative institutional leadership of the Jewish community."
Kadima is very proud of our legacy and strives to continue this fight. Each July 9th, we are offered the opportunity to mark an everyday practice of furthering our collective legacy towards liberation.

May our founders be blessed. May those who have sustained Kadima and created in its image be blessed. May those who are being raised in Kadima be blessed. May those carrying on Kadima be blessed. May those innovating and evolving Kadima be blessed. May those we've lost along the way be remembered as a blessing and may peace be upon them. And may we continue to pursue justice in health, connection, solidarity, and joy.

In love & solidarity, Shabbat Shalom,
Kadima Staff & Board
Learn more about Kadima’s history:

Thank you to the University of Washington Libraries for the use of these historic images.

]]><![CDATA[Zeal, Independence, and Moral Imagination]]>Thu, 02 Jul 2026 16:46:06 GMThttps://www.kadima.org/blog/zeal-independence-and-moral-imaginationThis week we meet one of the Torah's most troubling figures. Pinchas, the grandson of Aaron the High Priest, sees the Israelite leader Zimri publicly bringing Cozbi, a Midianite noblewoman, into the camp during a moment of communal and spiritual crisis. Pinchas takes a spear and kills them both. The event seems to cause a plague to end, and God grants Pinchas a brit shalom – a covenant of peace.

For generations, commentators have struggled with this story. Is Pinchas held up as a model of religious courage, or is the Torah preserving a moment that should leave us profoundly uneasy? The rabbis seem to recognize the danger. The Talmud teaches that while kana'im pog'in bo – "zealots may strike him" – if someone comes to ask a rabbinic court whether they should act as Pinchas did, the answer is no (Sanhedrin 82a). Jewish tradition remembers Pinchas, but it refuses to make him a precedent.

That restraint feels especially important this week.

This shabbat marks the 250th anniversary of the United States’ independence from England. I find myself less interested in celebrating than in honest recognition.

The American Jewish story has never been simple. This country became home for millions of Jews who escaped poverty, antisemitism, and violence. At the same time, America closed its doors to countless others through restrictive immigration laws, leaving many with nowhere to flee. The choices facing Jews in the early twentieth century were often impossibly constrained: to stay where they were and struggle or die, to seek refuge in a United States with tightening quotas, or to become part of the Zionist enterprise. There were no clean options, only history bearing down on vulnerable people.

Nor is the broader American story simple. This nation tried to hold out extraordinary promises while repeatedly denying them through slavery, the dispossession and genocide of Indigenous peoples, exclusion, incarceration, and systems of terrible inequity that endure today. Remembering 250 years means resisting both triumphalism and cynicism. It means telling the truth about the gifts people have found here and the harms that have made those gifts unevenly available.

Perhaps that is why I find myself drawn less to Pinchas than to the daughters of Zelophechad at the end of the parasha.

Machlah, Noa, Choglah, Milcah, and Tirtzah also confront injustice. But instead of picking up a spear, they bring their claim before the community and ask the Israelites – and G-d – to become more equitable – to live closer to their highest values. Adonai responds with a remarkable affirmation: ken b'not Tzelofchad dovrot – "The daughters of Zelophechad speak rightly."

And today ushers in the Three Weeks, beginning with the 17th of Tammuz. The rabbis teach that the Second Temple fell because of sinat chinam – baseless hatred (Yoma 9b). Whether or not that explains the destruction historically, it names a spiritual danger that never goes away. Communities unravel when certainty eclipses humility, when zeal overtakes wisdom, and when we forget that justice is meant to enlarge our humanity rather than diminish it.

May these Three Weeks deepen our capacity to remember honestly, argue courageously, and keep choosing the path of the daughters of Zelophechad: expanding justice not through certainty or force, but through moral imagination that leads to communal change.

Shabbat shalom,
R’ David

P.S. Speaking of three weeks, I will be away from the office for the next three weeks, stepping away from email and congregational responsibilities. I look forward to reconnecting when I return as we begin the ascent toward the New Year together. I wish you all a meaningful, safe, and rejuvenating stretch of summer in the meantime
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