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Sermon

Rosh

Hashana

(Undated)

As one mulls over High Holy Day sermon themes, there is a tremendous urge to speak about global problems such as Apartheid, Star Wars or the Mexican Earthquake because they are everybody’s TV monitor and seemingly make pale matters of a much more personal nature. Our personal lives seem of little consequence when we consider the global picture. Living in Chicago where the last steel mill has shut down, and where we’ve lost the race, for the Saturn automobile plant, with thousands of jobs, can make us believe that handling our own lives victoriously will make no difference to Chicago’s destiny.

What a tragic fallacy! Any view of history shows us that in perilous times, individuals willing to stand up and speak out provide strength and direction for an entire people. Franklin Delano Roosevelt saying, "We have nothing to fear but fear itself" that encourages a depressed America. It was Winston Churchill proclaiming "We shall fight on the beaches" that lifted a defeated Britain and gave it the courage fight on. It was a humble and unknown shepherd who stood with God at the burning bush who said "Here I am, send me." With these words, Moses took personal responsibility for his people’s problems. Often in spite of their recalcitrance, He transformed four hundred years of slavery into the Exodus from Egypt.

Everywhere we look we see the same truth. Be it Nelson Mandela and Bishop Tutu in South Africa, or Lech Walensa in Poland. Personal character, uplifted and inspired, becomes the catalyst for all social change.

If someone now says that this thought is obvious, the answer I must give is: Would that it were as obvious in practice as it is in theory. For everywhere, most people wait for God, or Saviors to deliver them. People most often turn to others instead of calling upon themselves for leadership. They petition government to renew neighborhoods and guarantee safety. Yet a closer look will reveal that little people -- individual’s hardly known -- rescued neighborhood after neighborhood in Chicago, Baltimore, Philadelphia and Washington. Little people pushed the gangs and prostitutes off the streets and made them safe for their children. It’s high time we spend less time transfixed with global anguish which few of us can alter and confront our own possibilities for serving the world.

What then stops us from taking personal responsibility is we know the direction man should take to perfect life?

For one thing, we are tempted to evade the assumption of personal responsibility because of self pity. How can any one, avoid looking on this stormy world without the temptation to curse being born in this generation? Everywhere we look there is trouble. What a perfect reason to feel sorry for ourselves...woe is us.

But, feeling sorry for oneself is on of the most disintegrating forces that play on our characters. And indulgence in self-pity is not the product of any one historic period. If some of us are self-pitter’s we may be certain that regardless of when we had lived, we would have fallen prey to the same malady, We would always find a reason to bemoan our time, our place...our fate.

With the problems of existence does not require wishful thinking of transport to some Utopia or Camelot. It requires honest and courageous dealing with our self.

The Scandinavians say, "The North Wind made the Viking." How true it is. Where did we get the idea that secure and pleasant living, trouble free and comfortable existence over made people good or great. Character and achievement are not born on satin cushions, but in confronting evil where we find it, and correcting wrong as it occurs. We can’t bemoan the facts of life but must respond. Here I am not hiding but confronting bravely doing our best no hiding but confronting bravely doing our best saying: "Let the North wind, make us Vikings."

Another mistake so many make is to believe that working on social problems can be a replacement for our own uplifted character. But we cannot build the great society out of the effective character. Social advancement can only be achieved by means of superior character. Overcoming racial prejudice or religious discrimination will not be achieved through social obtuseness. Being socially involved does not give one license to be combative and boorish. Certainly we cannot uplift the fallen by being condescending and patronizing. Incivility is not a proof of superior character cannot bring about the great society nor bring realization to our social vision! Yet some of the most socially active people we know are enraged and luxuriate in violence for their cause. They believe, theirs is the right to proven justice and ill treat all about them as payment for their social efforts.

Moses was wise when he said; I am a man of unclean lips. He realized that he had overcome his own personal and personal failings id he was to cast no doubt on God’s redemptive message. Neither can we call for uplifted character when in spite of elevated material standards we have depressed moral standards. If we have truly seek the improvement of society -- if we truly seek the improvement of society. Then we must begin with personal cleansing and regeneration. Anyone who has gone through the experiences of a deep interior transformation, changing his motives and improving his should understands that we cannot overcome our own sins by participating in on society’s reform. We are called upon to shoulder responsibility for our own humanization and the realization of our own divinity in order to advance society and lay the firm foundations of superior character by our own example.

Finally, we are tempted to evade dealing with personal responsibilities because we fell so small when compared with public problems. We are like grasshoppers in the face of the gigantic forces that sweep the world. That’s a feeling held by so many. After all, how could I be important in a world so over populated? Why should I perfect myself when AT&T fires 24,000 employees at a single crack? When I can be replaced by a single micro chip the size of a dime which can solve prodigious problems? To stand tall in the face of all the heaving of life seems at first glance, not the mark of great character but of arrogance.

I must admit that facing so many global life situations does erode the demand for shouldering person responsibility. There is plenty of justification of our self doubt, but in more thoughtful hours we can realize that we’ve tricked ourselves again. If at a time like ours a person is to remain level-headed he most not stumbles into a trap and believe that the titanic problems of our world have shrunk man’s value and ability. Such a view will jeopardize our very soul. For life is not determined for us. It is still determined by us.

Thos who lose faith in themselves, their abilities and their possibilities are those who in some earlier time would have discovered similar reasons for rationalizing helplessness and insignificance.

And we should realize that what a man sees as his role in the Universe is really what a man sees as his inner worth. The attitude of a man toward the cosmos or reward humanity is likely to be a reflection of his won self-image. If a man believes life is too big to change, he is saying I’m too small to count. If a man says humanity is too wicked to improve he has shrunk in his own estimation. But if a man believes he is a servant of God, than he realizes that the most tremendous forces in the wall are no cosmic but moral. One man watches a little bush burn and the whole race are transformed advanced. A big thing—Yes indeed. But all from a little beginning born should of an individual whose faith in his life’s work and his link with God could bless his heirs beyond imagination.

If you say but Rabbi -- how can we compare ourselves to Moses when Rambam says there was never a man like Moses? I only say and learn from Moses. Like Moses, we, too stand at Sinai. We stand in God’s presence by banishing both arrogance, tranquility and inner doubt. We who say "Hear O Israel," also emulate Moses as we respond to the call for an effortful, caring, life of service. We who believe that we bear God’s image, deeply believe we possess the divine capacity to confront the hard and the high with the diligence that moves men and advances life. We are not to small for life’s challenges, only, when we try to go it, alone, we are not alone. We stand in His presence, just as Moses and all true believers.

It is that faith which builds confidence and makes us aware of life’s tasks. May we ever respond to His call Hinneyni: Here I am send me.

Amen.