Note: These remarks were offered by Rabbi Offner at the Annual Meeting on May 14th:
The agenda for the Annual Meeting calls upon me to offer a “Review of the Year.” How does one offer a review of the year when just the past eight weeks already feel like a century? Time is funny that way, and no more so than during a pandemic. So as I reflect on this past year, I reflect most significantly on how a synagogue like ours, a synagogue that at its very heart is about bringing people together, how we made a pivot eight weeks ago, and how in a matter of hours we took everything that is precious to us – our prayers, our learning, our Torah, our life cycles and our social justice work – and we put it all on line and we turned our entire synagogue into a virtual reality.
Consider those two words: ‘virtual’ and ‘reality’. They used to be opposites. If it was virtual, it wasn’t real. Today those words are synonyms. We focus a lot of our efforts on the ‘virtual’ part, as those of us who barely knew how to save a word document, are all of a sudden faced with the need to navigate through the day with Zoom and Google Classroom and Facebook Live. Everything is now virtual. But ‘reality’ is another important word, because though it is now via technology, we are still coming together and we have created something very real. Synagogue life has not stopped, not for one second. If anything, we are more connected, more profoundly connected, as this pandemic has made all our religious language about life and death more acute and more manifest.
In just 2 short months we managed to put all of our Shabbat services on line. We have live onegs on line. We had a Passover Seder and Passover Meals and even hosted special guest speakers at our Shabbat services. We have an engaging Torah study every week on line. We even have Jewish Meditation on line.
We also have an emergency connection network at our synagogue right now that we lovingly call “Helping Hands,” so that every single member of our congregation has a contact person who can initiate delivery of groceries, a chat to mitigate against lonliness, delivery of masks and navigation of social services.
And yes, the cycle of life continues. I have conducted baby namings on line, and I have wept with mourners at shiva services, on line.
None of this could happen without the extraordinary dedication and service of our lay leadership and our staff. Our Executive Committee has been working overtime. Perhaps I should amend “overtime” to “all the time.” I do not know how they do it. And our staff. Working from home but carrying on. Because we have a lot of work to do. Kim is taking care of our building every day. The Cantor has put the entire Religious School on line, and God bless our Religious School teachers, who we will be honoring at our final T’filah this Sunday morning, for all they are doing to teach our children their aleph’s and their bet’s. Bonnie assures that you receive your Shofar Blast every week and the SHOFAR is delivered to your door each month. Jen Casillo continues to connect with our Preschool Students and, because of her magic, we anticipate a huge increase in enrollment for next year.
The ways we have pivoted and adjusted are remarkable. But equally remarkable is this: life continues. We continue to build for the future. Our Building Committee is hard at work. Our Capital Campaign Committee is hard at work. TBT was just awarded a $30,000 grant from the Community Grant for the Jewish Elderly from the Jewish Foundation of Greater New Haven, to start a new project of connecting our elder generations and our younger ones, a 2-Way L’Dor Vador.
We are preparing to say a fond farewell to Cantor Stanton who has touched all of us these past two years with his kind soul and majestic voice. And we have hired a new Cantor who is bursting with energy and eagerness to meet all of her new B’nai Mitzvah Students and to bring her vision to our Religious School and her spirituality to the bima.
Life continues. So in many ways, this evening is a celebration. It is a celebration of fortitude, of compassion, of determination and proof that ‘coming together’ continues to be at the heart of what we do as a synagogue. We do indeed come together in these unique times as we have done in the past and will continue to do in the future. And so we count our blessings.
Adonai Eloheinu, Adonai our God, we ask for your blessings upon this House of Hope. Bless us with safety and with love. Bless us with patience and with hope, bless us with good health and with peace.
Ken yihi ratzon (Let it be so),
Rabbi Offner