Join Us!

While we are all home-bound, Village Yontif is excited to announce ongoing Shabbat services.  We've been loving our weekly services, and the sense of community is restorative and healing. We hope that you will join us. 

Services run approximately 90 minutes.

A one-time registration for each is required.

Friday evening, Kabbalat Shabbat Services begin at 7:30 pm EST.

Soft beautiful traditional Shabbat melodies, more of a time for profound story-telling than study.
Services led by Daniel Neiden. Stories from Shellen Lubin.

Saturday morning, Shabbat Services begin at 10:30 am EST.

Services are free. Donations are gratefully accepted.

Give us one year of true silence

A year of the white of the blossoms and the green of the grass

A year of passionate love and a warm home stove

That we for once experience that which is good and that which is pleasant.

A year without voices of hatred and cries of the bereaved

Without the sight of blood, without the beating of war drums

Without the paralyzing fear of the worst of all

Without the laughter of the future that is buried in the ground.

Behold, we are not pleading for the treasures of kingdoms

Nor for transcendent joy and high-end luxury cars

Just for a modicum of tranquility and white of blossoms

Which we can easily boast of.

To get excited once in a while from the smells of autumn

To gallop toward joy with the speed of a whistling locomotive.

Build us a tent of peace now

And may we be worthy of sitting in it.

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Photo credit: 7-themes.com/collections/hdq-white-flowers-wallpapers/

Dear Congregants

The stunning, unprecedented storming of the United States Capitol by mobs of right-wing protesters, incited by a sitting president and his followers, and fueled by antisemitic conspiracies, is heartbreaking.

One cannot say it any more clearly or powerfully than David Axelrod did on CNN.  "I am in tears today," said Axelrod, who was born on the Lower East Side, had his Bar Mitzvah at the Brotherhood Synagogue, and became President Obama's top adviser.  "I am the son of an immigrant who fled a country because of scenes like this and came to the United States because this is a country of law," Axelrod said. "I am in tears today to see this scene, because this is not an American scene and this was not a necessary scene."  This was a scene that was hard to believe.  It is the country that President Trump has fostered throughout his term and by his refusal to concede a legally and fairly conducted election.

As Jodi Rudoren of The Forward points out, there's a straight line from Charlottesville in August, 2017, when Trump said of the white supremacist rally that led to the death of a counter-protester, "There are very fine people on both sides," to the events that culminated in yesterday's riot and attempt to overturn democracy.  The people who chanted, "Jews will not replace us" in Charlottesville were not fine people.  Rep. Mary Miller, the newly elected Illinois Republican who told the Capitol Hill crowd waving Trump flags on Wednesday that "Hitler was right" about anything does not seem like a very fine person. Nor does the man in the mob that stormed inside who was wearing a "Camp Auschwitz" shirt.  "This temple to democracy was desecrated," said the likely new Senate Majority Leader, Chuck Schumer. "This will be a stain on  our country not so easily washed away."

Each week we pray during our Shabbat service, when we recite the Prayer for our Country, we pray: "May citizens of all races and creeds forge a common bond in true harmony to banish hatred and bigotry, and to safeguard the ideals and free institutions that are the pride and glory of our country."  This prayer is also a call to action, and we have much work to do to heal the deep wounds and divisions which afflict the United States.

May the incoming elected officials rise to the responsibility the voters have entrusted to them to bring healing and exercise responsible government.

L'Shalom.