What a joy it was to spend these high holy days together. I felt so welcomed by our incredible community. The music was fantastic. The crowds were terrific. Like you, I left feeling ready for the year ahead. Thank you so much for making me and my family feel so at home during this special season.

I wanted to share with you the closing lines of my Rosh HaShanah sermon. I believe the message is important, as we all strive to ‘meet the moment’ and be what the world needs of us right now:

As we open the Book of Life to what we pray will be a year of life and love and healing, we are reminded that new beginnings can be hard, they are, and that our people have long faced down one daunting prospect after another, whether it was Moses taking us to a new land so long ago, or Esther announcing the dawn of a new day for the Jews of Shushan, whether it was our German and Polish and Russian relatives not a century ago, or our Israeli brothers and sisters confronting gross fear in 1948 or 1967 or 1973 or still today.

Whether it was American Jews starting over in this new land once upon a time or you and I waking up to a new year today. Our people have felt afraid again and again.

But you and I, we are here precisely for a time such as this, this chaotic and unnerving time for Americans and Jews, for parents, and grandparents. We are here for a time such as this. We all are.

We exist precisely for the scariness inherent in our world at this moment. You are Moses. You are Esther. You are here exactly now for the sake of the Jewish people, for the sake of this fragile nation and planet, for the sake of an Israel that needs us.

You are here precisely now for your children and your parents, your grandchildren, the friends and dear ones who need exactly you and exactly now.

Let’s march forward together, joining hands, joining hearts, and going together.