Come to Rabbi Lerner’s 80th Birthday Celebration
Saturday, February 11th, 2023 – Click on the Title for more info
Practice of Shabbat
Shabbat is the celebration of two monumental aspects of human life:
The creation of the universe.
Our liberation as a people from Egypt–and the resulting message that the world can be liberated from all forms of oppression.
Society/Politics
In the world of serious intellectual life, in the media, and in policy circles there is widespread sentiment that the current interest in spirituality is a silly and flaky fad that has no lasting significance. I believe, to the contrary, that the growing interest in spirituality is the cutting edge of a fundamental transformation that will change every aspect of our lives in the coming millennium. We are entering a new period in world history which will witness the triumph of spirit over the ethos of selfishness, materialism, and the kind of one-dimensional thinking that has brought our world to the edge of self-destruction.
Money & Values
If you are someone who has been blessed with financial well-being or wealth, you have a special opportunity to advance the process of spiritual development. You can become living proof to others that it is possible to live a life in which the pursuit of money is not the bottom line.
But money can also be a burden and a curse.
Shabbat
Shabbat (the Sabbath) is not simply about going to synagogue. It is a 25-hour spiritual, meditative, psychological, and intellectual process which involves a withdrawal from the normal consciousness of domination and control over time and space. On Shabbat, we enter into a consciousness that is focused on awe, wonder, amazement, celebration, pleasure (through food, sex, and intellectual exchange), aloneness, and community. As the psalm for Shabbat proclaims, “I rejoice in Your work, O God. I will exalt in the works of Your hands!”
Spirituality
The globalization of Spirit requires that we overcome the false dichotomy between changing ourselves and changing societal structures. At times we may be inclined to say, “I need to work on my own head first, then later I’ll try to change society.” But this strategy can be the beginning of a slippery slope toward narcissistic self-absorption, just as the “I’ll change society first and then worry about inner life” strategy can be a slippery slope to the insensitivity and spiritual obtuseness of most contemporary political movements. Emancipatory Spirituality encourages a living synthesis of individual and social transformation.
10 Commitments (Speech Acts/Divine Utterances)
Many of us find the notion of “commandments” oppressive and hierarchical. Yet we know that a community cannot be built on the principle of only doing what feels right at the moment––it requires a sense of responsibility to each other.