My Grandma Knows Everything

My grandma knows everything. I do not remember what age I was when I first began announcing this piece of information to the world. I do not remember the moment, either, that this realization first struck me as discernable and true. And yet there it was - beyond the lens of the more experienced (and perhaps jaded) eyes of a parent seeing her or his own parent; through the simple, noble and definitive vision of child - in the way that a grandchild can connect, understand and appreciate the wonder of a grandparent - it was quite clear to me: My grandma knows everything.

I would happily announce this paradigm of mine to anyone who would listen: my family, my friends and my grandmother, herself. In fact, she and I had our own song and dance that we would perform - quick and simple, knowing each other's unspoken cues - that would lead to conveying this maxim to an unwitting audience. Truth be told, this schtick had a certain shelf life that ended somewhere at the onset of young adulthood and the assumption that most of us young adults eventually embody - that we each know everything that we need to know. Even though I have not uttered this bromide in years - as I searched my mind and my heart for the words to share with you this morning - it was these words that I felt compelled to share and explore. My grandma knows everything.

What did Phyllis Bookatz know? Well, all of us who interacted with my grandma, were keenly aware of what she was thinking or feeling about a particular matter or person - whether we liked it or not. What one thinks and what one feels is not necessarily the same thing as what one knows. I am not standing here with a childlike wonder suggesting that she actually knew everything. My grandma would never claim to be a scholar filled with academic knowledge. As many times as I tried to sit at the feet of my elder and coax her to wax philosophical about questions of an existential or ideological nature, she never really thrived in that kind of exchange. She was too practical, too corporeal. So, I wonder: What did she know? My grandma knows everything.

The Hebrew word that we most commonly translate from the verb 'to know' is Da'at. It is used in a myriad of ways in the Tanach - expressing all kinds of knowing or knowledge - from knowing the difference between 'good and evil' to knowing someone in the 'biblical sense' to knowing what is true and how the world works because one's life experience. The mystics understand Da'at as the concrete and solid manifestation of our accumulated understanding and wisdom. The nature of Da'at is not about espousing pieces of information or overwhelming others with impressive data - but honestly and boldly living what we know. Da'at is how we embody what we understand, how we live the truths that are embedded in our hearts and souls. So, from what I thought I understood as a child to what I thought I understood no more as a young adult ... today, as a middle aged adult, I am quite clear in my mind and heart as I tell you: My grandma knows everything.

Phyllis Bookatz - in the way she lived her life - embodied this Da'at - this knowing - in how she worked, how she played; how she spent her time, energy and money; how she fought and how she loved. Within this life of actions, deeds and values we see what she knew. My grandma knows everything. However, 'everything', might take too long for us to cover in the time that I am given to celebrate her this morning. So, I ask you to indulge me as I share with you just a small portion of that 'everything' that I am blessed to understand and hopefully 'know' myself one day.

My grandma knows about working hard, commitment, perseverance and strength. With her practical, stick-to-it and serious nature - my grandmother was a doer. She was someone upon whom others could depend, someone who would get things done. She would not get caught up in the what-ifs or the emotionality of a task or a project - she would put her head down and do what she needed to do - because it needed to get done. There are many examples from her life about how she knew about these things. My aunts, uncle and mom can tell you examples from their childhood; my cousins share my witness to the thing she did - not just for the community - but for each one of us - the people at B'nai Jeshurun can share them, too and so can the countless others who knew Phyllis in one of her life endeavors. From among these numerous moments of commitment, perseverance and strength ... one profoundly speaks to me. I cannot speak about my grandmother without speaking about my grandfather. The two were inextricably combined in my memory and my heart. They were an entity, a force together. They were yin and yang before it was cool and hip to talk about people being yin and yang. As formidable (and sometimes intimidating) as each could be individually, they were more so together. And yet, almost three decades ago - my grandfather died in a slow, painful and treacherous manner. I remember feeling worried and concerned for her - how would she overcome this devastating loss of her Jules. To this day I am awed and inspired by the way that my grandma lived after he died. Tapping into her storehouse of a lifetime of acquired commitment, perseverance and strength - Phyllis crafted, created and forged a life - that while did not include her beloved Jules - did include meaning, purpose and love. She knew how to commit, to persevere to be strong and how to survive. My grandma knows everything.

My grandma knows about being Jewish. Identifying, acting and living as a Jewish person was essential to my grandmother's life. She knew the formal, more public ways that one might understand her Judaism. My grandmother's commitment to Heights Temple/B'nai Jeshurun and Israel Bonds are legendary. Her home (i.e. her kitchen) was ground zero for every significant Jewish holiday. I could go on and on listing these formal involvements and commitments of hers ... But there was more to what she knew about being a Jew. When I first decided to pursue a career as a rabbi in the Reform movement and not the Conservative one, I think I feared how she might respond ... having been so committed and immersed in a Conservative community that she and my grandfather loved so much. And yet, that was never the case for even a moment. From my grandmother, I have come to understand Judaism more deeply and broadly than than the lines drawn by its institutions. Again, while she would have never been one to express it - she lived Rabbi Mordechai Kaplan's understanding that Judaism was bigger being only a religion, or culture or ethnicity ... it is a civilization. And she embraced the fullness of this diversity and it's complexity. She supported and was supported by the religious, cultural, ethnic and national ways of being a Jew. She lived as if Judaism and being a Jew was bigger, larger and more important than any particular ritual or politics or doctrine - and held no patience when those (or other dynamics) got in the way of being a Jew. (And she would let anyone within earshot know what she thought.) When I began the path of becoming a Reform rabbi, I feared I might be taking steps away from her ... And what I have come to understand is that every step I took actually brought me closer to what she knew about being a Jew. Phyllis Bookatz knew about living a Jewish life. My grandma knows everything.

My grandma knows about family. We all here know the numbers ... four loving and devoted children; 4 sons and daughter in law who join in that love and devotion; 13 grandchildren, 12 and soon-to-be 14 great grandchildren. In many of our conversations and particularly in our last one, my grandmother wanted me to know how extremely blessed she felt to have the love and devotion of all of her children and grandchildren - she knew complete and genuine gratitude. Each of us can speak of the numerous ways that her presence in our lives mattered deeply to us and enriched us. And yet for me, what she knew ... what I have come to understand from her about family and relationships may be the most precious, essential and difficult lesson to learn. My grandma would not be one to teach the theology of Martin Buber, but she taught me a great deal about his lofty ideal about the nature of divinity. You see, Buber teaches that God is the name for what happens when two individuals love one another completely - for the other's gifts and for the other's limitations. I cannot speak of my grandmother without speaking about this precious piece of ultimate wisdom I learned from my relationship with her. A mature relationship means loving someone for all that they are - because of their greatest gifts and their most challenging limitations. The fact that I can stand here today speaking to you at her request - speaks to what she knew and what I seek to know in my own life. Families and intimate relationships are the most powerful and influential forces of nature in our lives. Like any force of nature they can elevate us and flatten us, bring us joy and pain. When we are able to love one another not in spite of, but because of our flaws and mistakes we are able to experience the full divinity embedded in each relationship in our lives. I understand from my grandma about the sweetness offering and receiving redemption and forgiveness; about the elastic nature of families and relationships and their power to impact and endure. Phyllis Bookatz knew about family. My grandma knows everything.

And now perhaps, in the realm that her soul dwells now ... she does truly know everything ... or maybe not. My grandma was always pretty clear - set in her practical and matter of fact way about life, death and what happens beyond this world. In fact, she often appeared as a foil when I have found myself teaching about Jewish views of life after death. She would represent the view that when we die, we die ... there is only this world and so the only thing we can do is make the best of it. Fitting to her nature and way of living in this world, and yet ... In the last year or so she seemed to open her mind to the possibility of another possibility. She would not talk extensively about this shift in ideology, except to mention the thought or possibility of being with my grandfather again someday. For my grandma, this simple suggestion was seismic in nature ... and brings me great comfort. Comfort in the shadow of death and our grief that she may be with right now her beloved Jules. Comfort in the light of the mystery of life that no matter where she may be that all she knew is such an essential and fundamental part of the lives of those of us who cherish and love her.

For my beloved grandma, who knows everything ... I offer these words from the poet as my prayer of thanksgiving for the blessing of your presence in all of our lives:

Epitaph (Merritt Malloy)

When I die
Give what’s left of me away
To children
And old men that wait to die.
And if you need to cry,
Cry for your brother
Walking the street beside you.
And when you need me,
Put your arms
Around anyone
And give them

What you need to give to me.
I want to leave you something,
Something better
Than words
Or sounds.

Look for me
In the people I’ve known
Or loved,
And if you cannot give me away,
At least let me live on your eyes
And not on your mind.

You can love me most
By letting
Hands touch hands,
By letting
Bodies touch bodies,
And by letting go
Of children
That need to be free.

Love doesn’t die,
People do.
So, when all that’s left of me
Is love,
Give me away.

Avraham Burg on the Kidnapped Israeli Young Men

I find my heart filled with anguish as I pray for the safe return of the three young Israeli men who were kidnapped this past week.  The anguish only grows as I observe the myriad of reaction from Jews, Palestinians and the rest of the world.  As I struggle to identify and express my own thoughts and feelings, I find perspective in the candor and integrity of the words of Avram Burg, former Speaker of the Israeli Knesset (Parliament).   - R.Mo

The Palestinians: A kidnapped society

We are incapable of understanding the suffering of a society, its cry, and the future of an entire nation that has been kidnapped by us.

Ha’aretz/| Jun. 18, 2014 | 12:09 PM | By Avraham Burg

Our hearts are in pain over those three teenage boys whose identities we did not even know a moment ago, but who now belong to all of us. Each of them looks like my own son, the son of every one of my friends and their friends.

Like many people, I hope with all my heart that the moment will come when we see them alive among us, and that all this tension dissipates into blissful relief. I hope, with real trembling, but I cannot and do not want to ignore the silenced truth that surrounds their kidnapping.

Those three boys are truly unfortunate. They are unfortunate because of the trap of fear in which they have been captured, the uncertainty and the fact that their lives are in great danger. Our hearts are in pain, and go out to them and their families because of how, in a single moment, they had to step into the glare of publicity. And these teenagers are unfortunate because of the lie in which they have lived their lives — lives of supposed normalcy that were built upon the foundations of that greatest of Israeli injustices: the occupation.

Now let us turn from their wretchedness to our own. For us, a dramatic or traumatic event is always a very clear, refined and transparent moment. All the plans and failures, the fears and hopes, burst out.

Here are Israel's shallow prime minister and the bumbling police, the masses who cling to futile prayers and not to a moment of human peace. Here are the country's hypocritical chief rabbis, who just a month ago demanded promises from the pope regarding the future of the Jewish people, but in their daily lives remain silent about the fate of the people who are our neighbors, trampled beneath the pressure of occupation and racism under the leadership of rabbis who receive exorbitant salaries and benefits.

Suddenly everything erupts, is expressed in its very essence, emerging from the darkness into the sunlight. This is precisely the moment to examine intentions — because, as said, everything is out in the open.

First, Netanyahu’s hollowness. Not much needs to be said about it. After all, he is the one who guided all the Israeli-Palestinians talks into the tight corner of the prisoner release issue. He is also the one who, with his own words, violated Israel’s commitment to release the last group of Palestinian prisoners. He is also the one who maneuvered the Palestinian Authority into the corner of unifying with Hamas.

So what exactly is he complaining about, with his dramatic and schmaltzy comments and gestures? His immediate, conditioned, unconsidered response shows that he was just waiting for this moment, if only to say "I told you so." And now that he has, the real question surfaces: What exactly is he telling us? The painful answer: Nothing at all.

Israel's left wing, too, which is supposedly dignified, has become the gaping mouth of the carp stuffed with some sort of gray substance, lying on the Passover seder plate of the gluttonous right wing. The latter, too, are embroiled in a disgraceful fight over a piece of the pie of legitimacy that belongs to the sticky consensus.

How can it be that not one of them has gotten up and said: Everyone who is on the other side of this black line bears the responsibility. It is not pleasant, but it is the truth. And it is never pleasant, after all.

Before there is a kidnapping — why talk? Nobody is listening anyway because things are quiet. And the moment they kidnap, we must not talk (as the executive director of Peace Now said), since our kidnapped ones are gone. And once it all ends (in what could be, God forbid, a personal tragedy or a collective tragedy that nobody cares about), why should we talk? Everybody is busy once again with Israeli supermodel Bar Refaeli, the FIFA World Cup or the next scandal.

So this is also a pure moment of insulation. Not the insulation of homes which we are used to, but the insulation of hearts. Few people on the right and the left – except for Gideon Levy, Uri Misgav and a few other cautious and frightened commentators – are trying to grasp the deep roots of the kidnapping.

We absolve ourselves by saying, “They handed out sweets” after hearing about the kidnapping. Their happiness makes us glad, since the happier they are over our suffering, the more exempt we are from taking an interest in them and their suffering. But there is no way around it: This is a sort of happiness that demands deeper study and understanding.

All of Palestinian society is a kidnapped society. Like many of the Israelis who performed “significant service” in the army, many of the readers of this column, or their children, entered the home of a Palestinian family in the middle of the night by surprise, with violence, and simply took away the father, brother or uncle, with determination and insensitivity. That is kidnapping, and it happens every day. And what about their administrative detainees?

What is all this if not one big official, evil and unjust kidnapping that we all participate in and never pay the price for? That is the fate of tens of thousands of detainees and others under arrest, who stayed, or are staying, in Israel’s prisons – quite a few of them for no good reason, falsely imprisoned on false pretexts. The vast majority of them have been exposed to the appendages of military justice, and none of us cares a whit.

All these things have turned the topic of the prisoners into the main subject in the lives of the occupied society. There is not a single household without a detainee or prisoner. So why is it so difficult to understand their joy and our pain, fears and worry notwithstanding? It was, and can still be, otherwise.

However, as long as the Israeli government shuts all the gates of freedom, flees from all real negotiations that could solve the conflict, refuses to make good-will gestures, lies and blatantly violates its own commitments – violence is all that remains for them.

It has already been proven any number of times that kidnapping sets one free. It seems once again that Israel understands nothing but violence. What does that say about us? This response of ours — which ranges between "They deserve it" and "They are all terrorists," to "I am following orders" and "I did not know what was going on" — says more about us than it does about them.

Despite the enormous and inspiring success of Breaking the Silence (an NGO that collects testimony from soldiers who've served in the West Bank), our own total silence is still the loudest thing around us. We are willing to go out of our minds over one odd and troublesome Pollard, a lone kidnap victim or three kidnap victims, but we are incapable of understanding the suffering of a whole society, its cry, and the future of an entire nation that has been kidnapped by us.

This, too, needs to be said and heard during this moment of clarity — and as loudly as possible.

Sabbatical Preparations and Ruminations

It is now four times that I have been blessed to prepare for Sabbatical during the month of January. In each of the past three years and in this time of preparation I find myself buoyed by a strong sense of gratitude for this gift of time and for the relationship between Micah and me from which the gift originates. 

While I find myself equally thankful each year as I prepare, I also find that each year I am more deeply aware of the thought I put into about how I utilize this gift of time. I feel the responsibility to use it well -- so that this communal investment of time in me pays dividends for the community. I also feel the need within me to construct my time and activities in such a fashion that I can dwell in that Sacred Place Within and emerge with whatever gifts are meant to be taken from such a Place.

During these preparations in which I have a hyper-focus on my choices of how I spend my time - I make a mental note. I want to remember this sense of anticipation and potential for this upcoming time - because I sense that it should apply to each and every moment throughout the year. We should regard and approach each moment - no matter when we spend it - with the same responsibility, urgency and possibility.

After four years of preparing for and spending Sabbatical time, I think I am beginning to understand that I take this time to better understand this reality and how I may humbly share its wisdom to those whose hearts wish to understand it, too. And, so I begin both efforts by spending this time of preparation sharing these thoughts with you ...

It's Still Love

When it seems that evil reveals itself within our most vulnerable places, Love is still our most powerful response. When it seems that we have lost control over the instruments of violence, Love is still the most powerful weapon in our arsenal. When we cannot understand - with our minds or our hearts - how or why the innocent must suffer, Love is still our most powerful idea. When we lose our balance by the undertow of our radical vulnerability and the precarious nature of life, Love is still our most powerful anchor. When we doubt if we can truly construct a world that just, compassionate and peaceful, Love is still our most powerful tool.

With AND To

We are grateful that we are able to look in the rear view at the recent exchange of violence between Israel and Gaza - let us be thankful that both sides were able to agree to at least a temporary cessation of hostilities. We still feel emboldened by the way the Jewish community stood together during this crisis. Across emails, facebook pages, twitter feeds, synagogue and organization websites and within the walls of these organizations we saw, heard and responded to the call to ‘Stand Up’ WITH Israel ... exactly as we should have done so.

As people in Jewish households who have deep connections to this sacred place, our connections to Israel call upon us to ‘Stand Up’ WITH Israel as its inhabitants face constant and threatening rocket fire from Gaza ... to ‘Stand Up’ WITH Israel as it faces the challenge of needing to work with those who challenges Israel’s very legitimacy ... to ‘Stand Up’ with Israel as the country’s leadership struggles to make the difficult decisions between policy and politics; diplomacy and combat, life and death.

And yet, because we so deeply value Israel for all that which it stands ... not only must we ‘Stand Up’ WITH Israel, we must endeavor to - chastened by the highest values of our Jewish tradition - ‘Stand Up’ TO Israel. The latest exchange of violence did not occur in a vacuum. There is a deteriorating political and social context to which Israel holds its share of accountability.

As people in Jewish households who hold deep connections with this sacred place our connections to Israel call upon us to ‘Stand Up’ TO Israel and speak frankly and honestly about social and moral repercussions of the continued placement and expansion of the Separation Barrier ... to ‘Stand Up’ TO Israel and speak frankly and honestly about the continued development of Settlements in spite of the way that development impedes on future possibilities for reconciliation and peace ... to ‘Stand Up’ TO Israel and lovingly remind our Jewish sisters and brothers about the vision of acting as sovereign power in a fashion that promotes and supports justice and freedom for ALL of its inhabitants.

As I struggle with the most effective way to walk this balance between standing up WITH and TO, I am deeply grateful for the perspective and wisdom of my friend, Dalia Landau. Dalia is one of the protagonists in The Lemon Tree and the heart and soul of Open House - a peace education center - in Ramle, Israel. Dalia lives and embodies this struggle of standing up WITH and TO with sincerity and grace. In the aftermath of the recent exchange of hostilities, she wrote to me:

“I am sure that you are as relieved for the cease fire as I am. It is tenuous. Most of the reserve soldiers have not yet been sent home. Please continue praying for all of us. Once again the saddest thing is the mutual projections of evil on each other, the competition over how much destruction we have caused each other. Well, nothing new. This is what war is about is it not? Today, there is no such thing as settling a conflict in the battlefield, is there? The whole country is the field ... At such times our work at Open House becomes so much more challenging. Suspicion grows, feelings are on edge. At such times, it becomes very difficult to bear disagreement or another point of view. Minority voices are hardly tolerated ... How are we ever to be able to create confidence building measures without people getting to know each other? This is the question that bugs me continuously ... Now a whole generation is growing in the West Bank and Gaza that has not met Israelis except as soldiers or bomber planes flying over their heads.”

The cessation of hostilities between Israel and Gaza is just the beginning - or more accurately the continuation - of the real work that must be done by all of us who claim connection to this sacred place. We need to speak the truth - the truth of our love and support for Israel and its people; the truth of our grave concern for the perpetually worsening situation between Israel and Palestinians; the truth about the cost to the collective Jewish soul that continues to escalate.

So, read and learn more and what intelligent people from all perspectives have to say; talk and listen respectfully and honestly with those whose views you share and with those whose views are different from your own and support those organizations like Open House - that lovingly and tirelessly work hard to stand up WITH and TO this place we value so deeply.

I Was Not There - Reflections on the Aurora Movie Theater Tragedy

Each year on the 9th day of the Hebrew month of Av (Tisha B’Av) - sometime between late July and mid-August the Jewish tradition pushes us to look directly into the face of tragedy, destruction, pain and loss. Tisha B’Av is not a very widely observed Jewish ritual ... perhaps Jews get enough opportunities to relive and remember the tragic and painful moments in Jewish history throughout the course of the year. Perhaps the destruction of the First and Second Temples are no more than intellectual abstractions to human beings living twenty to twenty five centuries after these historical moments. This year in spite of the lack of regard that most of us have for Tisha B’Av, its spirit intrigues and challenges me ...

This year on Tisha B’Av (it was the 29th of July) - we Jews of Colorado found ourselves looking directly into the face of tragedy, destruction, pain and loss ... as all of Colorado reacts and strives to come together after the tragic violence at the Aurora movie theater on July 20, 2012. Many of us Jews may not have even been aware of the observance, yet less actually observing the rituals of Tisha B’Av - reciting from the book of Lamentations or fasting. And yet, we all have been spending the days before (will spend the many of the days following) Tisha B’Av engaged in the tribulation of confronting the occurrence of and the nature of tragedy in our midst.

Using the lens of Tisha B’Av is helpful to me as I try and face the horrific consequences of these violent and reprehensible acts. Like most fellow Denverites and Coloradans, I was not there in the theater that night. I do not know anyone who was there, was injured or killed. I do not even begin to approach an understanding of the physical and emotional trauma, pain and suffering of those who were in theater or the loved ones of those who were in the theater. Still, I am absorbed by a morbid curiosity of what happened and how it happened that night; I am filled with (and ask with others) essential and profound questions about fate, human nature, evil, suffering; I am confronted by feelings of fear, doubt, anger and anxiety. I was not there - I am not traumatized because I was present or mourning a death of someone who was murdered or figuring out how to support those who survived, but I feel on some level that it happened to me, to all of us. Why do I have that perception and what do I do with it?

The template of the Tisha B’Av observance guides me in responding to these questions. Tisha B’Av acknowledges the way that tragic events touch, impact and potentially change the entire collective in which these events occur. The tradition does not have us act as if we were there - to in some way artificially or selfishly take upon ourselves the raw terror of experiencing that pain, loss and trauma. It does not blur the line between victim/survivor and concerned bystander/fellow community member. It allows, encourages, those of us who were not there - to question and to feel the raw realities that such tragedies force us to confront. Our tradition allows us the sacred, yet burdensome task of examining our human condition and the society that it has created. Our tradition nudges us to sit face to face with our stark limitations and our profound possibilities - and the consequences of realizing or not realizing each.

Why does Jewish tradition allow us and force us to feel and consider such things? From the appropriate emotional and historical distance, the important and difficult process of engaging with these moments grounds us to our deepest values and clarifies our broadest visions. This process pushes and prods us to intensely pursue justice and peace; to actively choose life; to be fully present in each loving encounter.

While we continue to support and nurture those whose lives were so violently changed in that movie theater that night, let us - with the appropriate distance - fully engage in this sacred and burdensome task. Let us feel those emotions - fear for our safety, angst in the realization of the actual randomness of life in the context of illusory order; impotence in our stark realization that we are so limited in being able to protect our children, our partners, our loved ones and even ourselves. Let us ask our questions on sin and forgiveness; on the ethics and morality of gun control and capital punishment; on the essence of human nature; on the nature and presence of evil; on the pain and suffering of the innocent and the righteous. May the experience of such emotions and our response to such questions help us comfort the bereaved, care for the injured and push and inspire us to create a just, loving and peaceful place in our world.

A Little Less Majesty This Morning

It is usually on days like this one - clear, crisp, sunny with the beautiful sight of the mountains beckoning that I feel great pride in living in Colorado. However, as bright as the sun is shining and as majestic as the stunning purple mountains may be this morning ... the wattage is not as high this morning as I reflect upon the cowardly and bigoted decision made by the Colorado House of Representatives. The news is not news at this juncture - the Colorado House of Representatives refused to even allow a vote on a the latest bill asking for equal rights for ANY two human beings - regardless of their gender -- to enjoy the same rights and protection that our government exists to preserve and protect. I am sad, ashamed and angry.

The words - no the wisdom and the call - of tradition that come to mind are simple ones from the prophet Micah: Do Justly. Love Mercy. Walk Humbly. I think the justice and the mercy explain themselves in the case for the Civil Union bill ... don’t they? Justice seems to point toward providing equitable treatment to all law abiding, tax paying citizens in this great American society. The fact that we question whether one group - on account of their sexual orientation - to be worthy of equal treatment is nothing short of prejudice and bigotry. No matter how such a rationalization is cloaked in the finery of religious belief or political expediency - it is no different that limiting another’s rights because of the color of one’s skin, the type of sexual organs on one’s body or the way one believes or does not believe in a deity.

And if justice does not get us there, then it would be time to jump on the train of mercy. Love your neighbor as yourself. (Micah 6:8) What is hateful to you, do not do to others. (Talmud, Shabbat 31a) Remember the stranger for you, too, were strangers in the land of Egypt. (Leviticus 19:34) How can anyone of us who has been touched by successful or unsuccessful marriages (which I am pretty sure which include all of us) not have the greatest respect and compassion for any two human beings who endeavor to roll up their sleeves and try and create a marriage, a family and a home? It is one of the most challenging and rewarding paths that we human beings have the opportunity upon which to walk. Our state is merciless when it is able to say to some of those human beings who have engaged in this sacred task: No, you do not have the legal right to visit your partner when they lie sick and possibly dying in a hospital. No, you do not have the legal right to help determine the care this loved one in these scenarios. No, no, no ... but yes to the rest of you.

Humility is the charge for us to know our place in the larger webs of lives and life in which we dwell. Our lawmakers work for us. Our lawmakers place - both liberal and conservative - is to make their best efforts to bring considered, relevant and constructive laws to our representatives for approval. While each of these employees of ours must be expected and encouraged to stay true to their personal and political values - humility is about understanding one’s place. It is about knowing where ‘I’ end and the larger entity - which is Civic Colorado - begins. It is about maturely allowing that larger web to take thoughtful, sincere input from that ‘I’ and then letting that web follow its own course. And no matter whether you sit on the right or the left or somewhere in between, humility is ultimately about trusting - dare I say ‘having faith’ - in the larger web that is Civic Colorado and living with those decisions - especially when those decisions do not reflect your sincere and thoughtful perspective.

Do Justly. Love Mercy Walk Humbly. Six words that I find refuge in as I look to return the wattage of Colorado and all of its glory to its genuine strength.

Food Sensitivities

I am thinking a lot about food at the moment ... not because I am hungry as I write this post, but because I am in the midst of a twenty-one day cleanse. Under the guidance of Jen Nassi - my holistic health coach - Renee and I are participating in an exhaustive eating exercise. During these three weeks we are eliminating many foods that are common to our everyday diet and adding foods that will help our bodies remove toxins and work more efficiently.

For the first time in a long time (albeit collaterally) I am observing Kashrut. No meat, so no worries about animals’ cud chewing proclivities or the cleft-ness of their hooves. No dairy, so there is no cheese to put on that waiting hamburger (that I cannot eat). The cleanse maintains no ideological connection to these emblematic rituals of the Jewish Dietary laws. However, I believe that my cleanse and the spirit of Kashrut are profoundly connected. The traditional Jewish expression of eating properly has evolved into different sets of dishes of milk and meat and butchers who know how to kill and animal in a certain manner - there are other paths to follow from this original practice. Kashrut or Kosher means ‘fit’ or ‘proper’. In that sense the command to keep Kashrut can be understood as a charge to to produce and consume foods that are fit and proper - fit and proper for my body, for my spirit and for the world around me. Even though I have followed the traditional sense of Kashrut before in my life, during these three weeks I think I may be keeping kosher - eating ‘properly’ - in a way that I have never done before.

The idea of what is fit and proper for me (and the world) physically and spiritually contains a wide range of considerations. For example ... I pay close attention to how my body reacts and works quite differently when think so differently about the food I ingest. I observe how often I associate a choice of what to eat and when to eat it by an emotion (a treat for a long run or because I have had a long day).  I notice the resources (time, money, intellectual) needed to make these choices. I pay attention to how what I choose to eat connects me to (Renee, with whom I am sharing this exercise) or disconnects me from (spending time with family and friends over meals, drinks, etc.) the social interactions that sustain me. I reflect upon the way I contribute to justice, compassion or peace for my world around me because of the way my food is produced and distributed.

I invite you to take a day to keep ‘kosher’ ... to simply pay attention to the ‘fitness’ of the food and drinks you choose to ingest for a day. Don’t even worry about changing anything you eat because of the attention you are paying to your food ... just consider what you put into your mouth for the day. Why are eating or drinking in that moment? What physical need does what you are choosing to eat or drink fulfill? (Hunger, exhaustion) What spiritual need does what you are choosing to eat or drinking fulfill? (Anxiety, loneliness, celebration). How will the nature of this particular food that you are ingesting affect your body and its function? How did the production of this kind of food affect other living things? (Animals, human beings, the environment)

There is great potential and even power in every single choice we make ... from the obvious life-changing choices to the mundane choice of everyday life that lose our attention and their meaning.