Dearest Friends,
I’m thinking of all of you as my family and I prepare for Pesach. Only a couple of months ago, Rabbi Leener, the Board and I were starting exciting conversations about the meaningful and fun ways we planned to spend Pesach 2020 together. Then all of our lives changed, permanently.
For the past weeks leading up to Pesach, I’ve been playing this question in my head in the quiet moments between the chaos: what is the connection between crisis and freedom, or in 2020, between pandemic and the Pesach exodus story? What am I meant to learn by living the juxtaposition of these seemingly exclusive states of being?
Crisis is a state in which one is not in control and is not his/her own master, as events and circumstances rapidly change around them. Freedom, as my daughters have been learning in school, is ‘when you can make your own choices’. Freedom is a state in which one is in control, gets to choose, and, often, gets to plan.
I considered searching for a perfect Chazal quote or an esoteric Torah passage to pull the ‘answer’ to this together, but instead, as I rode my bike this morning,scarf across my face, trying to clear my head, I knew that my premise was faulty.
When we’re ‘free’, are we really in control? You might know the Yiddish phrase "a mensch tracht un gut lacht" (Man plans and God laughs) - and indeed, we see it in the story of Pesach itself. The Tribe of Israel leaves Egypt and finally is free to make its own choices and to go straight to the promised land, where it can control its own destiny. However, the journey takes a different route. Similarly, when we at PHS were planning Pesach, we were confident that we had things all figured out. And then, COVID.
From this, I choose to learn a lesson of humility and faith – that I will plan and I will forge ahead but I also know that I’m not fully in control of my journey.
When we’re in crisis, are we out of control? Yes…yet, no. Look at how we’ve come together in crisis, how we have chosen to build community and meaning, and how we’ve supported one another – whether through virtual Shiva calls and Minyanim, running errands for those in quarantine, organizing and distributing Seder boxes, supporting our medical professionals in their heroic work, celebrating the joy of new life, or simply being there to listen.
In the face of seeming chaos, I invite you to join me in choosing to learn a lesson of the power of personal impact and of faith in our collective humanity.
May you have a meaningful, healthy, and perhaps even humble Pesach, one that gives you the sense of freedom as you recount our people’s journey from hardship to a better future. And, may we all be together again soon in a time of restored peace.
With love, Chag Kasher V’Sameach,
Shushana Young
PHS President
