Some of you have suggested that I am naïve—perhaps willfully so. Others have told me I don’t truly understand Israelis, or that I’ve grown too “tribal.” Some have even gone so far as to imply that, by aligning myself too closely with the State of Israel, I’m complicit in something genocidal.
These are heavy times. These are heavy words.
And I know that for some of you, there’s a real disconnect between the rabbi you think you know and what you’ve heard me saying or seen me writing—especially since October 7, 2023.
(listen for the full blog or go to https://www.cskhouston.com/hearourvoice to read)

Heschel and Gaza

I’m not going to craft another list of facts to defend Israel’s moral military restraint or highlight the IDF’s legal and ethical accountability systems. I won’t recite doctrine or try to sanitize reality. Mistakes have been made—some unbearable. But I will point out that 381 million people live in the Middle East, and just 8 million Jews—.02% of the population—live in Israel because they are not allowed to live anywhere else in the region. Israel’s land mass makes up just .002% of the entire Middle East.

Moral Fatigues

We are looking forward to an inspiring High Holy Days season and can’t wait to welcome you. One highlight: on Kol Nidre (Yom Kippur evening – October 1), we are thrilled to welcome the Divisi Strings Quartet to our bima, joining Daphnee Johnson, Kelly Dean, Andrew Lienhard, and our soloist (in her 8th year), Hannah Madeleine Goodman. Together, they will lift our spirits higher than ever before.
At CSK, everyone is welcome. No membership or dues are required to register. We simply invite your generosity, as even holy inspiration comes with earthly bills to pay. cskhouston.com



Waves of concern, Circles of care

One of the lighter discoveries I’ve come to appreciate while traveling is the simple joy of “scootering” around a city. Yes, scooters carry their share of controversy—safety concerns, cluttered sidewalks, and general urban chaos—but in Tel Aviv I found them both useful and delightful. They are also highly regulated. For example, as I cruised down the boardwalk one evening, my scooter automatically slowed itself to 9 km/h in a congested pedestrian zone. At 9 p.m., under the glow of streetlights, I passed one beach volleyball court after another—each lit up and full of players, hundreds of them, laughing, diving, and spiking. 

Israel, scooters, and volleyball at Night

If the RPMs of your brain waves keep getting interrupted by a record scratch that repeats phrases like, “Why me?” or “What about me?” or “When is it my turn?”, you may have fallen into the circle of control. To climb your way out, just try to remember, “It’s always your turn. You just need to remember to take it.” Then reexamine your yearning in terms of what you can actually do – what power is in your own hands already? And as the Nike commercial says, “Just do it.” 

Just Do It

And there we are, on Rosh Hashanah, check in hand, with a list of what we have consumed over the past year: how much credit have we drawn upon and how much did we reinvest? How much stability have we weakened, and how much have we shored up?  How much optimism have we squandered and how much hope have we reinstilled? 

Check please!

For anyone old enough to remember where they were when the towers came down on September 11, 2001, we still live with the shock. Maybe we learn from our past. May we learn from our strength and resilience.

Kaddish for September 11

Millenial survival against all odds (the story of the Jews) isn’t at all the only reason we should observe our rituals and traditions, but it’s a good start. Showing up, inviting ourselves into the moment, freeing ourselves from only rational measures of the successes and failures of our lives is what we are called to, and especially because we can do so without fear of missiles and rockets raining down on us, I ask you to not only bring your bodies to our Yamim Noraim (Days of Awe), but don’t forget your minds, and souls, memories, and imagination. 

Tzeva Adom - Red Alert

Rejoice!

Find the good!

Join Rabbi Scott Hausman-Weiss from Congregation Shma Koleinu for "Conversations with the Rabbi", a podcast focused on world affairs, matters of the heart and how to view it all through a spiritual lens.