The Hasidic masters taught that as hidden, elusive, or otherwise hard to find, there is always light somewhere. The world could not exist without it. Sometimes we only find the light after we crack open all that obscures it.
Life teaches us that the cracking is so often a bitterly painful thing. Shattering hurts. And religion teaches that we must become better, wiser, more compassionate people—people who protect light, nurture light, guard it from that within us and among that threatens to obscure it—so we need not go through shatterings again and again and again.
Judaism enjoins that as we grow into better versions of ourselves, we not let our despair that we are not yet there overcome us and snuff out the search for the light that already inheres in our world, again however obscured. Judaism insists we remain unflinching in our seeking, even when we feel so very lost in the dark.
This tenacity in the search for light and resistance to being overcome by despair is what Hanukkah has always signified for me, and it does so now more than ever.
This is what I pray that all lights of all the holidays of the season will reignite in all of our souls.
Particularly during these heartbreaking times, I find glimmers of hope in all efforts to humanize and connect across vast differences and seeming impasses—efforts both longstanding and entirely new. Recently, I joined such an effort as Associate Director for In Your Shoes™ Research and Practice Center. I am moved to share with the SCS community what I wrote in the piece welcoming me to the role:
In Your Shoes™ offers me a way to double-down on my commitment to pursuing a better world, and to contribute to the ongoing, tenacious peace and justice work of the countless individuals and organizations I have been privileged to engage with over the years. Along with all those doing this work, I refuse to give up on the values and visions that we have worked so hard to bring to each other and our communities. It isn’t easy. But it is the best way I know to remain fully alive and to live purposefully, openly, and with hope in this broken and blessed world.
For those particularly invested in engaging with the issues facing Israelis and Palestinians, I commend you to learn more from this small sampling of co-existence organizations and resources I have personally worked with over the years, including:
The Hotline for Israel/Palestine founded by current Harvard undergraduate students, which non-judgmentally fields all questions and offers multilayered responses and resources for further reading from a range of perspectives on Israel and Palestine.
In this week’s post, Rabbi Rachel Gartner, SCS Senior Advisor for Pastoral Care, remembers the milestone moments of this past year and invites deep reflection on the summer to come.
Over the course of this academic year, Mission in Motion has aspired to provide insight and inspiration to enhance your experience in the classroom, energize you in your work, and empower and uplift you in your life.
As the year began, we invited you to consider making time — in what we knew would be a very busy year ahead — for contemplation, or what Jesuit Walter Burghardt calls “taking a long loving look at the real,” and to consider what it might mean for you to live in greater alignment with what you see.
At that season we also shared insights from the Prisons and Justice Initiative winter retreat where we reflected that the candles at Hanukkah, and lights on a Christmas tree teach: that there is warmth and radiance even when days are at their shortest and nights at their coldest; that it’s important not only to pursue a perfected world but also to affirm all the perfect moments in life along the way; and, that there’s tremendous value in hearing the little harmonies that arise amidst life’s cacophony and seeing the many sparks of light amidst life’s darker times.
In a post on Teach the Speech, we took lessons from Dr. King’s spectacular speech, The Drum Major’s Instinct, in which he told us how he wanted to be remembered: “I want you to say that I tried to love and serve humanity.” We reflected on the fact that in his words are an implicit teaching for us: “A life of professional significance should be assessed on the basis of how one shares their gifts with others and helps realize a more just and inclusive community … and [serve] a higher purpose in life.”
In the spring, we encouraged you to consider, as we did on the student retreat, the “why” of your work, and what it might look like to make a slight change, either internally or in an external action of some kind, that puts one in closer touch with the why of their day-to-day life.
Now, as the summer arrives, and time opens and slows, perhaps you too might slow down and open up. We wonder whether returning to some of these ideas might help you do so. We humbly and prayerfully hope they might. We wonder too how summer might color the lens through which you read these questions.
What are the particular gifts of summer that might be worthy of your greater praise?
What does it mean to live in alignment with the aspects of your life that summer shows you?
How might you bring the light and joys of summer to those in our communities struggling through dark winter nights?
What insights into the “why” of your work and of your life does summer uniquely offer up to you?
May taking a long loving look at the summer days ahead yield you many meaningful insights that carry you through all the seasons, that strengthen the work of your hearts and hands, and that ultimately bring benefit and blessing to all.
What does it really mean to pursue community in diversity?
To address that I start with a point that’s admittedly obvious, but nevertheless warrants emphasizing so we don’t miss the nuanced meaning of this core Georgetown value.
You’ll note that the value we’re discussing is not simply “Diversity” but “Communityin Diversity.”
Community inDiversity means more than bringing a diverse group of people into a space together and congratulating ourselves for doing so. Communityin Diversity suggests something much deeper, and, to my mind, much more sacred than that. It’s about creating spaces of earned trust and demonstrated care that support each of us in showing up in the fullness of who we are with honesty and authenticity.
“True belonging is the spiritual practice of believing in and belonging to yourself so deeply that you can share your most authentic self with the world and find sacredness in both being a part of something and standing alone in the wilderness. True belonging doesn’t require you to change who you are; it requires you to be who you are.”
In the context of diversity, community that invites authenticity doesn’t just happen. It has to be carefully constructed.
A biodiverse garden in which every species thrives doesn’t just blossom from a bag of mixed seeds. Such beauty takes cultivation; caring, thoughtful, sensitive, sustained, and devoted cultivation. Like tending such a garden, cultivating community in diversity takes careful, thoughtful work. But cultivating community in diversity can be really fun, too, and profoundly rewarding, and reaps abundant beautiful blessings.
One of the most exciting ways I’ve seen Georgetown live its commitment to community in diversity is through a program I am now privileged to work with called In Your Shoes.
A signature methodology of The Laboratory for Global Performance and Politics at Georgetown University, In Your Shoes employs techniques rooted in theatrical performance and dialogue to bring participants of diverse political, cultural, and religious backgrounds and beliefs into deep, challenging, and mutually respectful encounters with one another to foster curiosity, self-discovery, and greater mutual understanding and appreciation.
The In Your Shoes process is rooted in paired, prompted dialogues between participants. The dialogue prompts give participants space to talk openly in ways that activate their own personal story, rather than merely opinions or statements of belief. Often the topics speak to common experiences that cut across ideological and cultural divides – loneliness, grief, hope, belonging, loss, anxiety about the future, family, faith, and the larger meaning and purpose of our human existence. These pair conversations are recorded and participants then curate sections of the other person’s words and transcribe into a script. Participant pairs then return to the group (or in some cases also to an outside audience), and metaphorically step into one another’s shoes by performing one another’s words!
The results of the In Your Shoes simple but profound process are incredibly moving to experience and to behold.
In the coming months, In Your Shoes will be expanding its offerings. I’ll share these opportunities with the SCS community as they develop, and hopefully have the blessing of moving through the process with members of the SCS community towards ever greater community in all our beautiful diversity.
In this week’s Mission in Motion, Rabbi Rachel Gartner, SCS Senior Advisor for Pastoral Care, reflects on a recent retreat with students from Georgetown’s Prisons and Justice Initiative (PJI) Paralegal Program seen here at their recent graduation.
It’s just over a week since I had the distinct honor of facilitating SCS’s Prisons and Justice Initiative’s (PJI) Mayor’s Office on Returning Citizen Affairs (MORCA) Paralegal Fellows’ Retreat. Tonight, I’m sitting near my hanukkiah* and, as I write, I find myself reflecting on Hanukkah and the retreat in light of one another. I can honestly say that the remarkable fellows on that retreat taught me things that will deepen the way I experience Hanukkah – and so many other things – for the rest of my life.
I am so grateful.
Every night of Hanukkah, many Jewish households light the hanukkiah and place it in our windows, as the tradition requires. On the windowsill, the lights act as:
symbols of resilience
offerings of light
statements of both faith and pride
a testament to the miracle of Hanukkah
The miracle of Hanukkah is in part a miracle of triumph and redemption in the face of great odds. Hanukkah recalls a time when powerful rulers sought to permanently suppress Jewish traditions, teachings, and practices; to humiliate and frighten Jews into abandoning our sense of peoplehood; and to “choose” full-on assimilation. In sum, to extinguish our light.
But Hanukkah reminds us – with God’s help, the Jewish people didn’t let that happen.
The word “hanukkah” literally means “to dedicate.” On the first Hanukkah, Jews rededicated our holy Temple in Jerusalem after its desecration by a tyrannical ruling class. Every Hanukkah since, Jews are meant to rededicate ourselves to bringing about a future time when the entire world is redeemed from tyrants and oppression. We recommit to the active pursuit of a time when peace, justice, righteousness, and love will reign supreme. We rededicate ourselves to bringing about a time when every single human being is free, secure, resourced, and cherished just as they are, with their full identity and full dignity fully intact. Every Hanukkah we rededicate ourselves to the holy task of bringing about a fully perfected world.
Which brings me to the retreat.
Among the many spiritual gifts I received from the fellows that day (and days since) was the reminder of the importance of not only pursuing a perfected world but of also affirming all the perfect moments in life along the way.
One fellow shared that their confidence in God’s providence came from those moments when they were able to access deep calm amidst what they described as their life’s nearly unbearably chaotic turbulence. Another named as holy the many times in life that they’d discovered patches of solid ground amidst violently shifting sands.
I know I can be so focused on getting to the promised times that I am often unable to see the moments of redemption along the way, to hear the little harmonies amidst life’s cacophony, to
see the many sparks of light amidst life’s darker times.
This Hanukkah, thanks to the fellows, I’ll see things a bit differently. This year, I’ll be rededicating myself to staying open and attuned to catching the holiness that life offers up all around us and within us every day; the holiness of resilience, of calm, of fortitude, of insight, of transformation, of growth, and of contribution. This year, I aspire to cherish the small but significant moments of redemption, even amidst today’s serious social, emotional, political, and environmental challenges. Even as we seek to transform the world into the one we wish to live in.
May the lights of the season guide our hearts and hands towards actualizing that world, bimheriah b’yammeinu – speedily in our days.
And please, consider joining us on a future retreat. You’ll be amazed at how much warmth and light a little rest and reconnection can bring!
*For the record: Menorah simply means candelabra! The eight-candled (plus one) menorah we use for Hanukkah is called a hanukkiah. If you really want to show all you know, call it a “hanukkiah,” but it’s not a problem in the least to call it a menorah! Either works.
I am delighted to be writing for this wonderful blog, and even more so that Jamie’s last post, along with the occasion of this last weekend’s graduate student “Rest, Recharge, Renew” retreat give me such a powerful entry point.
During my last 11 years on the hilltop, it has been a consistent joy to discover aspects of Ignatian spirituality that resonate with aspects of Jewish tradition and the other traditions represented on campus. My hope in interfaith engagement is always that different traditions can provide new angles, food for further thought, and sometimes even deeper illumination into the places where they connect. All this, without needing to connect in every place!
This week’s post is offered by Rabbi Rachel Gartner, SCS Senior Advisor for Spiritual Care, who reflects on the contemplative themes and interfaith possibilities of last weekend’s “Rest, Recharge, Renew” retreat for graduate and professional students. Rabbi Gartner also shares about the way that sacred events, like Shabbat, help us step outside of ordinary life in order to move toward it more contemplatively.
Jamie’s last blog post explored one such area of connection and resonance. One of my favorites, quite frankly.
In the last blog post Jamie sagely reminded us of the potential spiritual and emotional pitfalls of an overcommitted lifestyle, warning: “[E]ven busy adults who have important tasks to accomplish everyday can develop an unhealthy relationship to time.” One of the dangers of a utilitarian relationship with time so prevalent for so many of us these days is that it can make time into a possession that we need to use productively, and using time to contemplate doesn’t fit into our notion of productivity and therefore is a waste of our possession.
Indeed. In a context in which we don’t see contemplation as productive, it can be really hard to make the case for it. My experience in multifaith settings over the last two decades tells me that making the case for contemplation has become one of the central roles for contemporary clergy of any background, precisely because it has become so profoundly challenging and precisely because we believe so profoundly in it.
Thankfully, for me, it’s easy to make the case. Enter the Torah.
Jews like to joke that, through Torah, we brought the world the concept of the weekend; in the form of Shabbat. During Shabbat, Jews construct what Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel called a cathedral in time:
“Judaism teaches us to be attached to holiness in time, to be attached to sacred events, to learn how to consecrate sanctuaries that emerge from the magnificent stream of a year. The Sabbaths are our great cathedrals.”
As the sun sets on the eve of Shabbat, we light our plain white candles – one for everyone in the household – raise a glass of wine or juice, break simple bread, and step into that sanctuary in time. There, we leave behind the regular flow of time and the productivity we imbed in it. We do this not in order to escape life, but in order to enter into it more deeply. We step outside of ordinary life so we can then turn toward it contemplatively and “see and taste” (Psalm 34) the goodness of all of life.
If Shabbat were a person, she would high-five, fist-bump, or elbow-bump the Jesuit Walter Burghardt for naming and affirming contemplation as a “long loving look at the real” which inspires as “experiential awareness of reality” and a “way of entering into communion with reality.”
Judaism, in particular the mystical strain of Judaism, teaches that all of reality is a manifestation of the Divine. That God not merely permeates reality, but reality is an expression or embodiment of the essence of God. Seeking metaphors to describe this hard-to-grasp concept, Jewish mystics often refer to reality as a garment of God. This garment is woven of aspects of God’s very being – so it is itself ultimately Divine in both origin and nature. Jewish mystics teach that our spiritual goal is to attain the awareness that this is the true nature of all of life. We do this through what they call devekut (lit. cleaving). Devekut is essentially a communion with the Divine (through, in part, our experiential awareness of reality) that allows us to see and sense the godliness hidden within every single aspect of the material world. Through devekut we come to know intellectually, as well as to sense in our very being, the ultimate truth that all of reality is sacred, all of reality is One.
Through rest, reflection, song, prayer, communal conversation, and Torah study, Shabbat becomes a weekly, extended, and communal contemplative pursuit of – and ideally the attainment of – devekut.
We conclude Shabbat the way we begin it. In a ritual called havdallah (lit. distinction) we light candles, we drink wine or juice, and in place of eating sweet challah, we smell aromatic spices – a symbolic last whiff of the extra-soulfulness we are granted on Shabbat. Unlike the singular and white Shabbat candle, the havdallah candle contains many wicks and strands of wax composed of a rainbow of colors. The multifaceted candle invites us to weave our singular Shabbat consciousness into the glorious multifaceted activities of the week ahead. This idea is affirmed in some communities by actually placing a drop of havdallah wine or juice on our eyelids, as an invitation to see the rest of the week through Shabbat eyes. Or, as Burghardt, S.J., might express it, to turn to all of reality with a long and loving look that invites communion with it.
In Judaism, devekut is a highly valued end in and of itself. Its reward is deep joy. Through it, we find greater meaning and satisfaction in all that we do in life. And at the same time, there is a desired (even commanded) outcome of equal importance – namely, to live with greater intention, righteousness, kindness, and integrity as a result of our loving encounter with the real.
Contemplation, Shabbat, devekut are meant to lead to living in a way that honors what we come to know through them – that everything and everyone is ultimately divine in origin and nature. It’s our joyful and sacred obligation to live according to that awareness and to become maximally productive in the things that matter most: what we bring to this world and how we treat one another in it.
May it be so.
Please consider joining me and Jamie for upcoming retreats as they are announced. We’d love to see you at them.
