ISRAEL Erev Roshanah 5763 Friends, let me cut to the chase this High Holidays. The work is so long and the day so short, and the news, gevalt! 9/11, suicide bombings, Enron, drought, floods, fire, Martha Stewart, the stock market, Iraq, Bin Laden, enough already! Maybe we should drown out these names with noisemakers.

The Technology of Judaism The attack on the twin towers last fall changed everything. For many the event was a great shofar that awakened us to a world without guarantees.

Selichot: A Night of Forgiveness The tradition teaches that before the world was created, teshuvah existed. Before we walked the earth, we were given the gift of transformation, our highest expression of choice.

Behaving in God This is basic Judaism. Judge yourself and forgive others.

Selichot The word for the process of self-examination, making amends, and asking forgiveness is called teshuvah, which means both return and answer. It carries circularity in its definition

This Shabbat Shuvah, the Sabbath of Return to our highest selves, I invite you to explore with me our dealings not only with each other but with the world in which we live. As we celebrate the Holidays, we also celebrate the beauty of the fall. Is there a connection?

Community The High Holidays celebrate a human being's ability to grow and change. How do we talk about such an intensely personal experience?

The Light and the Dark of the High Holidays Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur frame the Days of Awe, days in which we are awed by that which we can change and also by that which we cannot change.