High Holy Days

I turned to King David and the Prophet Natan to learn how to fight fascism. I learned something much deeper and more sustaining for our time. Thumbnail background credit: Painting by Carole Silverstein Detail of “in the incense is tangled a cool moon” 58 x 42.5 inches framed), Acrylic Ink on Mylar, 2024 www.carolesilverstein.com

We cannot bypass the pain in pursuit of the promise. Only by confronting the trauma of our past, both individual and collective, can we build a future of expansive possibility. Thumbnail background art credit: Carole Silverstein Detail of “the velvety surfaces of dream” Acrylic Ink on Mylar, 48” x 36” 58 x 42.5 inches framed), Acrylic Ink on Mylar, 2024 https://www.carolesilverstein.com/

Lori Gottlieb and Rabbi Brous in a sermon-dialogue on the intersection of Jewish and therapeutic wisdom on issues of deep concern for us today: how to stay in relationship with people whose ideas break your heart, confirmation bias and how minds are changed (can they be?), how to overcome psychic numbing and stay centered and empathic, even when we’re hurting, how to hold hope and grow resiliency, and more. Dr. Gottlieb is a psychotherapist and New York Times bestselling author of Maybe You Should Talk to Someone, which has sold over one million copies and has been translated into over 30 languages. In addition to her clinical practice, she writes The New York Times “Ask the Therapist” advice column and is co-host of the popular “Dear Therapists” podcast and the advice podcast Since You Asked. A contributing writer for The Atlantic, she also wrote The Atlantic’s “Dear Therapist” advice column for six years. She is a sought-after expert appearing on Oprah, The Today Show, The Daily Show, Good Morning America, CBS Mornings, CNN, and NPR’s “Fresh Air” and her TED Talk was one of the Top 10 Most Watched of the Year. She is also an IKAR member, and mother of the wonderful Zachary Gottlieb, IKAR teen extraordinaire.

We are facing a spiritual catastrophe. In the small space between prophecy and distinct possibility, we must forge a new path.

We’re living in a world of constant distraction and alerts and noise, and we’re exhausted. But we also don’t know how to get out of this internally and externally constructed trap. What can these holidays help us learn about the necessity of stillness and silence in order to go back out into the world? How can they help us rediscover our connection with ourselves and with each other?

There is a dominant story in America today—a story of isolation, alienation, and narrow-minded extremism, fueled by a deeply unsettling convergence of right- and left-wing antisemitism. This story—propagated by a would-be authoritarian—plays on our worst instincts: the smallness, the fear, the ever-present sense of scarcity. And it threatens to do untold damage. We must write something new.

The only way forward is one broken heart next to another, crying together, awakening to the reality that grief is our common bond.

The Torah of Joy, and the Power, Promise, and Necessity of Laughter in Dark Times. | Rosh Hashanah II 5785

Hope doesn’t die, and despair is a privilege we cannot afford. | Rosh Hashanah I 5785

What can returning to a place surface for us? And what does our tradition show us can come from that journey? | Erev Rosh Hashanah 5785

How must we respond to the danger posed by Israel’s extreme, ultranationalist government?

U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy & Rabbi Sharon Brous in conversation.

Kol Nidre Sermon 5784.

Pastor Eddie Anderson, Reverend Zachary Hoover, and Rabbi Sharon Brous in conversation on Rosh Hashanah day 2 5784.

Some reflections on ending well, and what we pray will never end, offered on my father’s shloshim—the end of the most intense period of mourning.

Erev Rosh Hashanah Sermon. Engaging fully in the introspection of this High Holiday season can land us deep in shame and unable to move. But there is another way: be honest about our shortcomings, witness them and embrace them, and then transform them into something else entirely.

Yom Kippur 5783/2022. I spent the summer reading banned books. Here’s what I learned: empathy poses the greatest threat to tyranny. Art is the antidote to numbness. And Torah is the most dangerous book of all.  

Rosh Hoshanah I, 5783. Our world is crying out for a subversive sequel, a redemption narrative. It’s time to write a new and better, more just and more inclusive version of our story. We must plant seeds for the future now, before it’s too late.    

Erev Rosh Hashanah 5783/2022 The Earth’s chorus of voices demands moral engagement, a new approach to our planet in peril.

Yom Kippur 5782/2021 Sermon. In this time of us vs them, tribalism and violence, dehumanization and cruelty, we must remember: we belong to each other.

Kol Nidre 5782/2021 Sermon. Angels appear in moments of vulnerability and fear. They are sent on sacred missions at particular moments to offer moral strength, clarity and hope. This is a call to recognize the angels among us, and to hear when we, too, are called to step forward on a sacred mission of our own.

Rosh Hashanah II, 5782 Sermon. My brother and I have been having this recurring argument, for the last five years or so. And he always wins. And the basic question always being debated is, “Are we doomed?

Rosh Hashanah I, 5782 Sermon. We’re taught calculus and economics, US History and British Literature in school, but we’re hardly taught anything at all about how to get quiet, how to find awe, to cultivate conscience, to develop a moral compass. We start the year with a call to stillness: a reordering of our inner world. A discernment practice that is both spiritually and morally audacious, and utterly essential today.

Erev Rosh Hashanah 5782 Sermon.

Yom Kippur 5781 Sermon.

Kol Nidre 5781 Sermon. At some point, we will emerge from the acute, multilayered crises of our time. We’re not there yet. Before us will be battles great and small. This will be a defining moment, not only for our nation, but for each of us. We must act with fierce determination in the coming months, and even as we confront these challenges with everything we’ve got, we must plant for tomorrow, holding faith that those seeds will eventually bear fruit.

Rosh Hashana II 5781 Sermon. I want to tell you, today, a little bit about what it has been like being alone, living alone during this pseudo-quarantine, and spending most of my time, for half a year now, alone in my house. I want to talk about it in part because I know there are a lot of you out there who have been alone during this time, and I want to lift up this experience of ours – a shout of solidarity to my brothers and sisters in solitude! But I also want to talk about it because I learned things from that solitude, and because I think there’s something important about being alone that matters for us all.

Rosh Hashana 5781 Sermon. Our ancestors grieved. They told the truth about the past. And they built a new future—a counter-testimony to the world that was. This is our blueprint, an ancient wisdom born of suffering, and a way forward through painful and uncertain times.

Rabbi Kelieh Lebell – Erev Rosh Hashana 5781 Sermon. Given the harrowing year we’ve been having, you might think that the spiritual work we are called to do during this holy season, the work of teshuvah, is too much to ask of us. Haven’t we been through enough? Aren’t we just trying to survive all this? But it turns out that what we have been enduring might actually be the climate most ripe for self-reflection and transformation. While there has been so much upheaval and loss, all this forced, destructive change has also given us a chance to engage in generative change. This Rosh Hashanah, more than ever, we are galvanized for renewal and growth.

Erev Rosh Hashana 5781 Sermon. Brief remarks by Rabbi Sharon Brous on the loss of tzaddeket Ruth Bader Ginsberg.

Yom Kippur 5780 Sermon. After a hard year for the Jews, what can we learn about Jewish peoplehood, antisemitism, and our rightful place in a sometimes hostile world?

Kol Nidre 5780 Sermon. Lifting up the teachings and actions of our loved ones who have died may be the blessing, even when the dawn has yet to come.

Rosh Hashanah I, 5780 Sermon. The temperatures are rising, the Amazon is burning, storm surges are devastating our cities. It matters how we respond to this crisis. Even while we can’t do everything, there is no moral or scientific calculation that justifies doing nothing. We must be part of a culture shift, a shift in consciousness. We must build islands of spiritual resistance. דבר זה תלוי בנוּ– the matter depends on us.

Erev Rosh Hashanah, 5780 Sermon. Why doing good feels so good. And why we must re-commit to an ancient rabbinic ethic at this moment in our nation’s history.

Yom Kippur, 5779 Sermon. Rabbi Sharon Brous The epidemic of sexual assault and harassment thrives on many layers of cowardice and indifference, all too abundant in our culture of complicity. Now we must attune our ears to the stories told not by those with external power, but those with inner strength.

Kol Nidre, 5779 Sermon. Rabbi Sharon Brous Darkness may surround you, but it need not consume you. We are moon people: trained in heart and mind to find hope in the new light rising from the east.

Rosh Hashanah 2 5779 Sermon. Rabbis David Kasher and Ronit Tsadok One of the many reasons given for why we blow the shofar on Rosh Hashanah is that we want to connect ourselves to the story of Akeidat Yitzhak, the Binding of Isaac. What about that story might we tap into and how can it inform our experience of listening to the shofar?

Rosh Hashanah 1 5779 Sermon. Rabbi Sharon Brous These are trying times, but we must not let exhaustion or cynicism dull our senses. Our history has taught us: either you work to dismantle oppressive systems, or your inaction becomes the mortar that sustains them. Together we must build America anew: fierce, fair, and full of promise, equipped to hold us in all our diversity, complexity and beauty.

Erev Rosh Hashanah Sermon. Rabbi David Kasher What is Rosh Hashanah really about? It is never actually called ‘The New Year’ in the Torah itself. Instead, it is mysteriously referred to as, ‘A Day of Rest, In Memory of the Teruah Sound.’ But what exactly is that sound, and why would it be so important to remember it? A little detective work reveals the first time this sound was ever heard, and unlocks for us the true meaning of Rosh Hashanah.

Yom Kippur 5778 Sermon. Rabbi Sharon Brous Only when we confront the challenges — honestly and lovingly… when we open our eyes and our hearts, will new paradigms of possibility emerge.  

Kol Nidre 5778 Sermon. Rabbi Sharon Brous LOVE is the good news.

Rosh Hashanah 2 5778 Sermon. Rabbi Sharon Brous We can’t undo the past. But we can name it, take responsibility for it, and do everything in our power to fix what’s been broken. A Jewish case for REPARATIONS.

Rosh Hashanah 1 5778 Sermon. Rabbi Sharon Brous America is turning from a place with an undercurrent of antisemitism, to a place in which antisemitism is condoned by the state. What are we going to do about it?

Erev Rosh Hashanah 5778 Sermon. Rabbi Ronit Tsadok Our perception of time affects our decision-making, our compassion, and our overall well-being. It’s time to reframe and reclaim our relationship to time and the High Holy Days offer a model of how to do exactly that.

Yom Kippur 5777 Sermon. Rabbi Sharon Brous Can we break the cycle of fear -> anger -> cruelty-> fear? Non-complementarity, aka GRACE, as a spiritual practice

Kol Nidre 5777 Sermon. Rabbi Sharon Brous Talking about dying, death, grief and what comes after can imbue our lives with meaning, purpose and love.

High Holy Days Sermon. 2021/5782 2020/5781 All of our Sermons

Rosh Hashanah 2 5777 Sermon. Rabbis Sharon Brous and Ronit Tsadok (text study) Blessings are miseries are unfolding before our eyes. Let us not sleep through the revolution.

Rosh Hashanah 1 5777 Sermon. Rabbi Sharon Brous Race, violence and madness in an election year. How can we reclaim the soul of our country?

Erev Rosh Hashanah 5777 Sermon. Rabbi Ronit Tsadok What will it take for you to write a different story?

Yom Kippur 5776 Sermon. Rabbi Sharon Brous This is a sermon for those who have had enough.

Kol Nidre 5776 Sermon. Rabbi Sharon Brous Sometimes, holding fast to a dream can consume you and prevent you from living fully.

Rosh Hashanah 1 5776 Sermon. Rabbi Sharon Brous So are we better or worse off than we were one hundred years ago?

Erev Rosh Hashanah 5776 Sermon. Rabbi Ronit Tsadok As it turns out, not only are we supposed to love God, but this is a reciprocal relationship. God actually loves you.

Yom Kippur 5775 Sermon. Rabbi Sharon Brous Our generation is called to holy excavation. Dig beneath the edifice and the artifice to rediscover the foundational Jewish ideas.

Kol Nidre 5775 Sermon. Rabbi Sharon Brous Because somewhere in our hearts we know that it really ought to matter if we sneeze.

Rosh Hashanah 1 5775 Sermon. Rabbi Sharon Brous It’s in our DNA to be edgers — to see the world both with the privileged assumptions of an insider and the sensitivity and wakefulness of an outsider.

Erev Rosh Hashanah 5775 Sermon. Rabbi Ronit Tsadok By giving us a glimpse into the Divine perspective, prayer can transform the way we walk through the world by reminding us that we are as valuable as any other person – no more, no less.

Yom Kippur 5774 Sermon. Rabbi Sharon Brous  Flawed stories of the past shape our view of the world and our expectations of the future. It’s time to break the script.    

Rosh Hashanah 1 5774 Sermon. Rabbi Sharon Brous We are brought together by a sacred urge to make sense of the chaos of our lives so we can live more meaningfully, more aligned with our purpose in the world.

Yom Kippur 5773 Sermon. Rabbi Sharon Brous “ITS NOT MY PROBLEM” – IS THE PROBLEM.  As the world grows smaller –our responsibility grows bigger.

Kol Nidre 5773 Sermon. Rabbi Sharon Brous Who is wise? Halomed mikol adam – one who learns from everyone.

Rosh Hashanah 1 5773 Sermon. Rabbi Sharon Brous What if this decision is the one that comes to define you? Every moment, great and small, holds the opportunity for growth in strength and courage.

Erev Rosh Hashanah 5773 Sermon. Rabbi Sharon Brous Our goal is nothing less than to achieve, simultaneously – a deep and profound gratitude for what we have (sameah b’helko) – and also a wakeful recognition of what is not yet (od lo). You are enough. And yet enough is not nearly enough. Now let’s get back to work.