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Shanah Tovah... May we all be sealed in the book of life! NARAYEVER NEWS SEPTEMBER, OCTOBER 2016 AV, ELUL 5776, TISHREI 5777 NARAYEVER NEWS PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE Dear Friends, Our tradition teaches us that tzedakah, righteousness through giving to others, is a religious obligation. Through tzedakah we help others, but such acts can also fill our own lives with a sense of meaning and purpose. The Narayever has a very strong commitment to tzedakah, something we can all be proud of. Members give throughout the year to our many funds and also give generously of their time. jjjj ROSH HASHANAH APPEAL On Monday, October 3 we will be asking for contributions to support the Rosh Hashanah Appeal. Your donations will help the shul remain affordable for people in the community regardless of their circumstances. In addition, all synagogues face the same reality; increasing costs can only be met by the congregation's awareness of the need to make donations towards the shul's operations. This past year your donations to the Rosh Hashanah appeal helped fund a number of important shul projects including a Scholar-in-Residence program. Rabbi Jonathan Crane, our visiting scholar, drew on scriptural and rabbinic sources while discussing the concept of human dignity. Together we looked at contemporary questions and issues such as assisted death and welcoming refugees. The appeal also funded our new Tefillah (prayer) Coach and Coordinator project which will continue this year. The Narayever has a very strong commitment to using lay service leaders. Through the Tefillah project which guides existing service leaders and recruits new ones, our leaders have developed their davening skills and we have excellent new volunteers. Our Tefillah Coach helped the service leaders adapt to our new Lev Shalem siddur. It's been a pleasure for me to see old and new service leaders daven with confidence and play important roles on the bimah. Thank you to Rabbi Julia Appel who launched the first part of the program. Welcome to Rabbi Emma Gottlieb, our new Tefillah Coach and Coordinator. Many of you will know Rabbi Emma as she ably served as interim Youth and Family Engagement Coordinator in the Spring. Please see the report from our Fundraising Committee for more information about how else the appeal helps the shul. jjjj If we are not for ourselves, who will be for us? YOM KIPPUR APPEAL and POVERTY IN THE JEWISH COMMUNITY On Kol Nidre, October 11, we will be holding our annual drive for funds to help meet the needs of the less fortunate, both in Israel and in Toronto. Your donations to the Yom Kippur appeal help many organizations do excellent and important work. 2 SEPTEMBER, OCTOBER 2016 AV, ELUL 5776, TISHREI 5777 NARAYEVER NEWS PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE In my last President's Message I talked about the UJA report documenting increases in poverty in the Jewish community. Kehilla is an important organization that seeks to address poverty and has received funding from the Yom Kippur appeal. Since 1982 Kehilla has spearheaded a number of affordable housing initiatives. Your donations help support their Rental Assistance Program, aiding people in more than eighty households to live more affordably. Holocaust survivors and clients of Jewish Family and Child are among the beneficiaries. The findings from a program evaluation indicate that because of rental assistance, all recipients were better able to buy clothing and kosher and healthy food. Most reported an improvement in their levels of stress and a greater sense of belonging with the Jewish community. Rabbi Elkin serves on the Rabbinical Committee of Sukkahville, a design competition to re-imagine the traditional Sukkah. This year’s Sukkahville is on Sept. 22. Yasher koach to Nancy Singer a shul member who is the Executive Director of Kehilla, and current shul board members David Barkin, who serves on the boards of three Kehillah buildings, and Lorne Cappe, who was on the Kehillah board, helping with Sukkahville. The report from our Social Action Committee gives more details about the Yom Kippur appeal. If we are only for ourselves, what are we? HIGH HOLY DAYS As I write this report, staff and volunteers are very busy processing membership renewals and High Holy Day ticket orders. Lay leaders and ushers are being lined up. Under the leadership of Rabbi Elkin and Rabbi Weiss, they help make our services so beautiful and meaningful. L’Shanah Tovah! I hope this will be a year of good health and well-being for everyone. Liz Bohnen, President, Narayever Board of Governors [email protected] SEPTEMBER, OCTOBER 2016 AV, ELUL 5776, TISHREI 5777 3 NARAYEVER NEWS RABBI’S MESSAGE Dear Friends, In his new book, Putting God Second: How to Save Religion from Itself, Rabbi Donniel Hartman notes that based on the most often quoted passages in monotheistic scriptures, it might seem surprising that religion could be anything other than an ennobling force in human life. These passages from our Torah and prophets, from the New Testament, and from the Koran, point to a God who aspires to create kind, gentle, and compassionate people who feel and express concern for all of God's creatures, particularly the most vulnerable. But as we all know, it doesn't always work out that way. As Rabbi Hartman writes, “the failure of religion to produce individuals and societies that champion the values advocated in them is both puzzling and deeply unsettling. Even more troubling is that often religious faith itself is the catalyst that emboldens individuals and governments to murder, maim, harm, and control others in the service of 'their' God.” While believers are not necessarily worse than non-believers, the fact that a life with God does not seem consistently to make people better, is a failure of religion on its own terms.” We are entering the time of year when the gap between what our religion teaches us and how we actually live our lives is most conspicuous. Most of us do not murder or maim in the name of our religion, but we are often ethically and spiritually lazy, and do not hold ourselves up to the highest standard that we know, both from Scripture and from our kishkes, we should aim for. The problem isn't new; the ancient prophets of Israel railed against their countrymen for their moral and religious failures, and for their hypocrisy. The rabbis of old constructed an edifice of ritual and action around the theme of repentance, particularly focused at this time of year, because they knew we would fail, and that we needed to be woken up to do teshuvah and become better people. Whether you are a regular participant in shul life throughout the year, or the High Holy Day services are your main or only point of connection, or whether you are somewhere in between, I hope that you will see these days as an opportunity to challenge yourself to do an honest self-audit on where you've been and where you'd like to go in your life morally, ethically, and spiritually – as an individual, as a member of a family, a community, a society and as a human being. As Rabbi Hartman points out, no religion, including ours, automatically makes us better. This empirical fact can lead us to cynicism about religion, or it can lead us to action. My hope is that in addition to relishing the wonderfully community-building and family-affirming aspects of the High Holy Days, we will each challenge ourselves to see these days as an opportunity to stretch ourselves to become better. Wishing Shanah Tovah to the entire Narayever community, Rabbi Ed Elkin [email protected] 4 SEPTEMBER, OCTOBER 2016 AV, ELUL 5776, TISHREI 5777 NARAYEVER NEWS HIGH HOLY DAYS 5777 HIGH HOLIDAYS Rosh Hashanah this year begins Sunday evening, October 2, and Yom Kippur begins Tuesday evening, October 11. Once again, we will have services in two locations: at the shul, led by Rabbi Ed Elkin, and in the Dave & Bea Silverstein Gymnasium at the Miles Nadal JCC, led by Rabbi David Weiss. Michael Rumack will be leading services at the shul when Rabbi Elkin is at the JCC. Services at the shul are for members-only; those at the MNjcc are open to the public. At the MNJcc we have extensive alternative programming for children, youth, and adults, including supervised spaces for children on both evenings of Yom Kippur. If you'd like to learn more, please visit the shul’s website at www.narayever.ca. We are also looking for people to help with the High Holy Days. Whatever your skills, we encourage you to volunteer. Below are some areas where we need lots of people, all are welcome. Davening and Leyning Ushering Can you lead a service, or part of one, or read an Are you good at helping people get where they need aliyah of Torah or the haftorah? Great! We're always to go? Then consider signing up for a one hour shift as pleased to hear both new and familiar voices from the an usher. You will stand at the door to the sanctuary bimah. and help people find seats, washrooms or page Kathryn Polson Ferguson is coordinating davening numbers, and answer any questions that may come and leyning at the MNjcc, and Rabbi Elkin is organizing up. Added bonus: if you sign up at the MNjcc, we'll tell this at the shul. They'd love to hear from you. Our you the secret of how to locate seats at just the right Bimah at the MNjcc is wheelchair accessible. If you temperature. contact Kathryn or the Rabbi regarding participating, hhhh please wait for confirmation from them.

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