With the success of our virtual Seder, we can go forward with our virtual Shabbat service next Friday, April 24th at 6:30 PM. I’ll be sending out a linkage invitation early enough so you can figure out what has to be done on your end (I’ll have enough problems figuring what has to be done on mine!). If you are able and don’t have the Zoom app yet, have your eleven-year-old child, grandchild, great-grandchild, neighbor help you. If there’s no eleven-year-old, a four-year-old will undoubtedly do.
We’ll have candle-lighting, kiddush, motzi, a relatively short service and a d’var Torah. The theme of the service will be Yom HaShoah, Holocaust Memorial Day, which, in actuality, will have occurred this coming Monday evening and Tuesday.
We will be using the thin Gates of Prayer, Gray edition. I’ll also let you know what service to turn to. If you will participate, please let me know you would accept a reading part. Tell me if you want Hebrew or English. Email me your intent interimbethelrabbi@gmail.com by this Tuesday, April 21st. I do hope you’ll be an integral part of the service, if not by reading then by singing along. Please do NOT back out of “attending” assuming you must read. You need not read at all. I’m just inviting those who would like to read to let me know.
Michelle and Ron will let you know how to pick up a real (not virtual) copy of the prayer book at the Temple. A schedule will be sent out to you to stagger the pick-up so that the overwhelming number of congregants eager to join won’t have to worry about being six feet from the others.
This should be a pleasant enough experience. If it works, we’ll do it every other Shabbat evening or so. If it doesn’t work, I cannot wait to actually see you in person which, in fact, I cannot wait for even if it does work.
So, keep your eye out for the Zoom information, the schedule of pick-up dates, and let me know you’ll join us and participate. When? One week from today, Friday, April 24 at 6:30 PM
S h a b b a t S h a l o m and S t a y H e a l t h y !
(As the obvious authority figures in Jewish life, rabbis come in for more than their fair share of abuse. Rabbi Nachman of Bratislava, evidently no great fan of his colleagues, is quoted as having said that, “It was difficult for Satan alone to mislead the entire world, so he appointed rabbis in various communities)
Dr. Seuss’ view of social distancing at the 2020 Seder:
I do not want you in my house
I do not want you or your spouse
I do not wish to eat with you
At Seder one or Seder two!
Don’t get me wrong, I think you’re nice
But the CDC gave out this advice
You must avoid one plague more
And shoo Elijah from your door
At next year’s Seder we will tell
How we were all saved by Purell