From Rector Mike Kinman:
I’ve been asked repeatedly over the past few days when I/All Saints Church will be “making a statement” about the violence in Palestine/Israel.
I am realizing how easily I am drawn into being reactive instead of reflective … and that when that happens I am neither at my best self or providing my best leadership for others. I also recognize that the opportunity to step back and reflect is a privilege that in every situation (and certainly this one) many people do not have. And … when I do have it, I am trying to take it and use it for the greater good.
What I am doing this week is listening deeply to those I know who are most impacted by the atrocious violence that has been happening and that is happening in this Holy Land that so many of us share. I am occasionally amplifying voices (with their permission) that I believe provide an alternative to the militarized extremes that seem to be attracting more and more people and that seem to dominate the media coverage and certainly the social media expressions. (such as this piece I posted yesterday from our dear friend Rabbi Heather Ellen Miller – **scroll below to see that)
I am particularly grateful to All Saints’ Middle East Ministry for helping me to hear some voices I have not previously heard … and to our historic ministry partners like Heather Miller, Ken Chasen, Salam Al-Marayati … and longtime friends like Rabbi Susan Talve who have opened their hearts and minds to me or expressed a willingness to do so.
There is so much wisdom and so much love from people like these who have spent their lives working for the kind of justice that brings lasting peace … they … and so many of you … is what keeps me in a place of hope rather than despair.
There is no shortage of people who have been grieving in and about Israel/Palestine for generations unto centuries … and that grief is taking new and raw forms. This week, I will be endeavoring to listen, to show up, to hold hands, to wipe away tears.
This Wednesday evening at 6 pm, our weekly Taize worship service will be offered with special intention for the justice from which true peace springs in this Holy Land. I encourage you to come or to pray where you are.
I encourage you to examine the role media/social media consumption is playing in your life … spiritually, emotionally and physically. Be aware if what you are consuming makes you more compassionate and understanding, more curious of and loving toward those with whom you might disagree … or makes you feel hatred and anger toward them. Does it lead you to humanization or dehumanization. And be honest with yourself about how that fits in with who and how you want to be.
I encourage you to embrace the anger and pain you are feeling. It is righteous and justified. And I hope we can create and find spaces where we can express our anger and pain in ways that do not demonize and continue the traumatization of the other but that leave room for us meeting in the kind of mutually respected honesty from which true healing can spring.
I encourage you to take whatever time you are comfortable spending in silence (and maybe add a few seconds beyond that comfort level) and — however you pray — to invite peace to be the air you breathe in and the air you breathe out, to let the words you are hearing and the tears you are wiping away (including your own), rest on your heart and listen for God’s still small voice in your heart, in the spaces between words and on the lips of one another.
And … if you would like to talk and/or pray with me … please reach out.
I am certain I will have much to say about what I am hearing and the fruits of me trying to do all these things above in my preaching this Sunday. In the meantime, know I am holding you in prayer and solidarity and ask you to do the same for me.
Blessings and love.
Mike Kinman
Rector, All Saints Church
**from Rabbi Heather Miller:
We are blessed to be part of the
Keeping It Sacred community with Rabbi Heather Miller. As we are all grappling with how to respond to the violence in Palestine/Israel, Heather offers some sage words and resources. I hope you will read these and also join me and the KITS community for the healing prayer circle online on Thursday morning.
——
As you are aware, over the weekend, hundreds of Israeli civilians were brutally massacred, with thousands injured and countless numbers taken captive. Reading and watching footage of the human experiences of these wanton expressions of hatred are so frightening they are horrible beyond words. There is a lot of anger and sadness and concern among so many of us. A cloud over the Israeli people and Jews around the world has descended. Our Facebook feeds are paradoxically filled with images of happy couples, young families, and the elderly, with captions that describe how they have been taken captive, mutilated, violated, murdered. These people are our friends and relatives, and friends of friends and relatives of relatives.
It is awful to learn of such irrevocable expressions of hatred that Hamas has waged against people with such love and vitality in their eyes. This is what makes Hamas a terrorist organization, and not an organization of Palestinian freedom fighters. Because if they wanted to make a positive difference in the lives of Palestinians, they would know, as organizers, that killing kids enjoying life at a music festival is not a way to help the people of Gaza. It is heartbreaking to know that others all around Israel, including a woman in her 5th month of pregnancy, are being called up to active status in the military; called to plan a response, called to pick up weapons with the foreshadow of more death of more civilians in Israel and Gaza.
I am terrified of all the violence that has transpired, and what is to come. Violence breeds violence. Especially when the hands of power have a vested interest in the war machine and the political moves they make with it.
A focus on humanity needs to be centered at this time. And one voice I heard that calls us to do just that came as a desperate plea from one of the mothers of one of those taken captive. The woman’s name is Ahuva, which means “love,” and her daughter, Adi, is just 21 years old. She pleaded:
“I am a mother looking for her daughter; every minute that passes reduces the chances of finding her alive. And there is nothing anyone can do.
“So, I’m asking you if you have my daughter, I am asking you to remember what it is like being human.
“We are not animals. You can think, you can regret, you can fix what you did, you have to bring back everyone who is not armed, who is a civilian, all people, sick people, children, babies and women.
“You are not going to accomplish what you wanted to accomplish this way. Violence will get you nowhere. Nowhere. And what you are going to cause is on your side there will be so many mothers on your side that will tell you the same thing: ‘I am a mother, I want to protect my kid. That’s all that I want to do.’
“And, I am sure that all mothers in the other side, in Gaza and everywhere… are thinking the same thing. Please, please remember we are human, we are people… Please politicians… international relations please put all of this aside; we are human beings. Everybody, all of us, we are human beings. We are the same, we want the same…. Stop it now. Stop killing innocent people. You are not going to gain anything from this. There are going to be only more casualties. Only more mothers who cry about their children.”
It is far too easy to push humanity to the side, to give into our baser instincts of politics and power and greed and hysteria and revenge. Especially when civilians, young and old, are being held captive, violated, and murdered.
This is why the great Rabbi Hillel said in Mishnah Pirkei Avot 2:5:
וּבְמָקוֹם שֶׁאֵין אֲנָשִׁים, הִשְׁתַּדֵּל לִהְיוֹת אִיש
In a place where there is no humanity, strive to be a human.
In this awful time, it is imperative for us to sit with this challenge from 2,000 years ago.
What does it mean to respond in this moment to these atrocities and not lose our humanity?
What does it mean to be human in this moment? How can we honor, preserve, and defend life for our people and innocents on the other side?
How do we do that when the barbaric actions of terrorists are embedded with innocents?
How do we do this when they have captives who are our children, cousins, grandparents?
How can we resist giving into baser instincts and instead find new paths to a new future?
Please forgive me for asking these impossible questions but they must be asked. Someone must ask them because if no one asks them, we will just become mindless drones of a war machine that continues the cycle. And then, what of our humanity? What of the future? I ask in the spirit of the tradition that call rabbis to push us all to be intentional with our actions, to minimize suffering, and to affirm humanity. Please take care of yourself as well. I know many are taking mental health days and extra time with their families. Please make space for yourself.
And if you want to process what you’re experiencing with me, I have opened up my calendar to make time to meet with you. Please schedule a slot at
calendly.com/kitsrabbimiller
It is a huge priority to me to make time to tend to the spiritual needs of our community, and every single one of us has been impacted by these events.
As a final note, I want to thank our clergy and laity friends of other religions who are part of the KITS community— I am so grateful our community is rising up and supporting one another with tenderness and compassion. I have appreciated your caring messages, and I want our full membership to know that we are being held in all of our fears, worry, and anger. We are being held in this moment lovingly by one another.
It is a great example to encourage each of us to write to our loved ones and let them know we care. Please let them know our global community cares, as well. Please find ways to take care of yourself and reflect and write prayers and meet and gather. And please join us as we gather for an extended hour with our regular Healing Circle- this week beginning at 10am PT/1pm ET on Thursday, so that we can lift up our prayers. You may find the prayer I wrote below. At the gathering, we will also recite the prayer for the deceased, the Mourner’s Kaddish, together. Register HERE for that. (
https://www.keepingitsacred.com/upcoming…)
In these devastating times, it is important to make room for our humanity, and for community.
Rabbi Heather MillerFounder, Keeping It Sacred
The Situation
by Rabbi Heather Miller
My heart breaks
into a thousand pieces
for the innocence lost
and the innocence that will be lost
when little kids—
some not 120 lbs,
some barely 16 years old,
not yet able to drive—
are called to fire guns
and tanks
and drones.
Rather they should be home
playing video games
like Pac-Man or Super Mario Bros.
where lives are unlimited
as long as you have the time.
Where the consequences of
your actions are only
a change of a pixel’s color
on a flat screen,
not the flesh and blood consequences
of lives lost
of new mothers
in felled apartment buildings,
or kids riding bikes in the street.
I grieve for the innocence lost
in the perpetuation of violence,
and for the hatred bred from
the experience of death
and the incomprehensible injustice
associated.
I grieve for all those in the region.
Everyone
who is not looking for violence
but looking to feed and clothe
and house their families.
The surfers in Gaza.
The Israelis at the music festival.
All those who stroll the beach and
marvel at the colors of the seashells
on both sides of the border.
Those who would rather
celebrate the precious beauty of life,
as we all should,
than be pulled into war.
Those who would rather sing
joyfully at a wedding
than mournfully at a funeral.
And, I grieve for the feeling
that there isn’t anything I can do
to make it stop
to reverse the trend
to achieve peace
from here.
I have had this feeling before—
when my stepfather was diagnosed
with terminal cancer.
This is not
an experience I want to sit and watch.
These are not atrocities I want
my loved ones to experience.
This is awful.
Please, God, make it stop.
And let peace rain down
instead of missiles.
Amen.
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