Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel
Year 2 Day 51
“Modern man may be characterized as a being who is callous to catastrophes. A victim of enforced brutalization, his sensibility is being increasingly reduced; his sense of horror is on the wane. The distinction between right and wrong is becoming blurred. All that is left to us is our being horrified at the loss of our sense of horror.”(God in Search of Man pg. 369)
As we celebrate Thanksgiving today in light of the latest shooting in Va., it is time for us to stop lying to ourselves and one another about what is right and what is wrong. We have been blurring the distinction between right and wrong for the millennia and we have to stop engaging in this mendacity, in this idolatry. We can no longer call ourselves free people, decent people, people of faith while blaring these lines for our own benefit. The Gun Lobby, the people spewing hatred and lies about the elections, about another person’s sexual orientation, religion, etc are attempting to blur this distinction between right and wrong so they can stay in power, they can have control, they can be #1 in the land. How sad, how sick, how horrible. Yet, we continue to buy into the lies of these charlatans, we continue to give them the ‘cover’ of free speech. Riling people up to commit gun violence is not free speech-it is inappropriate speech. Re-writing history so the Native Americans look like the villains when we were taking their land, re-writing history to make it look like the slaves traders from Africa were doing the African’s a favor by enslaving them, is so beyond the pale and, yet, Ron De Santis and Greg Abbott are selling this horse manure and millions are shoveling it into their psyche!
What are we grateful for? Are we grateful that our “sensibility is being increasingly reduced:”, that we are becoming more and more callous to these mass shootings, some put the number this year at over 600 so far this year! Are we grateful that we can escape from the horror of our actions and the actions of people around us by sitting with family and friends today and have an oasis in the midst of the chaotic goings on in our world today? Are we grateful for blaming the Jews for killing Christ and sending space lasers to cause the landslides in Malibu as Marjorie Taylor Greene says. Are we grateful for blaming Muslims for all the problems we are facing today? Are we grateful we can blame LGBTQ+ for a myriad of catastrophes? Are we grateful that can blow off our sense of horror by blaming our actions, the actions of blurring right and wrong on someone else!
What are we grateful for? Are we grateful for our ancestors who, since Christopher Columbus sailed the ocean blue, risked their lives so we can live free? Are we aware of the horror of American First and their defeat during the WWII? Are we aware of myriad of people who believed the words on the Statue of Liberty and, because they had courage and hope, we are living in America? It ain’t perfect and, we are better than most other countries. I am an American and my father fought in WWII, he never really spoke about it, and on Thanksgiving, he was always grateful to be an American. Are we grateful enough to be an American that we take on the responsibility of caring for those “yearning to breathe free”? Are we grateful enough to be an American that we open our doors to another human being like the doors were opened for our ancestors? This is where the distinction between right and wrong is getting the most blurry. We have forgotten to return the favor, repay the debt that was taken on by our ancestors when they arrived on these shores, we are all immigrants, we are all strangers, we are all needy and we are all poor, this is our heritage, this is the roots of our being able to be an American so who are we to deny this same opportunity to another person in need, another person “yearning to breathe free” as our ancestors were?
What can we be grateful for? We need to be grateful for our ability to discern right from wrong, we need to be grateful for the many gifts we have been given, the most precious of all being freedom, living in a country that believes “All men are created equal” and extending this to women as well. We need to be grateful for our ability to let go of and take off our hard-skinned shell that we have kept on out of fear of being hurt, we need to be grateful for connection and love that we share with one another. We need to be grateful for our ability to sing praises to God, to people, to sing the song of our own soul in a country that gives us the sound stage which to do this. We need to be grateful for our desire to make our corner of the world a little better than when we found it, we need to be grateful to be able to live without brutalizing another human being anymore.
In recovery and in my life in recovery, I am grateful beyond words for the gifts I have received. Some of these gifts are the gifts of returning to family and friends after being callous and brutalizing, the gifts of love and connection with people I have been able to help and touch, the gifts of being the brother I always could be, the uncle I was wanting to be, the son my mother needed me to be, and the father Heather wanted and needed. Also, I learned how to be a husband and how to love unconditionally from Harriet Rossetto. I am grateful to Rabbi Heschel for impacting my life in ways I can’t even express and I am grateful for and to all of you for reading and being on this journey with me. God Bless and Stay Safe, Rabbi Mark