Yom Kippur at Faith House: An Awakening & Prayers
G’mar Chatimah Tovah
Last Wednesday, September 23, 2009, the Faith House Living Room gathering focused on “How to Enter the Holy of Holies: Preparing for Yom Kippur”, led by Amichai Lau-Lavie, Storahtelling Artists Shira Kline and Elana Bell, and Jill Minkoff. (image from High Holidays 5770)
Below is a powerful refection written by a Christian participant on her subway ride home after the gathering and prayers led by Jill Minkoff as part of the event.
AN AWAKENING
~ by Penny Elsley
Last Wednesday night I entered the Faith House Living Room gathering “How to Enter the Holy of Holies: Preparing for Yom Kippur” somewhat asleep to the gift of this moment in my life. As I heard these words – “The bold invitation of these days (leading up to Yom Kippur) is to go inside…to enter the inner life” – I was immediately awoken from my slumber, just like in the ancient days when people were awoken from their slumber by the blowing of the Shofar
I am walking in a space where I do not know what the future holds and I have been too busy “making” something happen to make room to receive the gift of this uncertainty.
We just need to make room. A lot of room. And the “living Room” experience of Faith House Manhattan was my awakening. I realized that in fact the deepest wells of life are dug in the times when we are forced to make room. When we are vulnerable, times when we can only rely on our neighbor, when we do not and cannot know what awaits us around the next corner, these are the moments to be treasured.
In this moment I am anxious and scared and disappointed…yet there is a surprising joy, for there has been a re-connection somewhere within me. Everything is noticeable right now. Maybe its because I need help…not just to find a job or to get a visa, but help finding my way. And so I am receptive, hanging off every word of every conversation…listening for that which resonates with me, with my dreams and my passions…where are the clues?…the signposts?…the hooks on which to hang my coat?
I seek because I need. I thirst because I feel something. I long because I am at the threshold…again. And the gift of all this, the richness of this liminal space, is that we realize in a very concrete way that we cannot survive without the other…and so the gloriousness of this design becomes apparent. The prayers, the encouragement, the wisdom and insights shared…all in the hope of offering me comfort…do indeed comfort… because they create a depth of space for trust, an emptiness for the new to arrive, for faith to be faith.
This is a different kind of emptiness, the kind we were created to thrive on. At a time when I am tempted to despair, instead I feel immense gratitude and hope. In the “living room” of Faith House, I was uplifted by companions on the journey. Being emptied and stripped of some of the false self, I have awoken to the promise of this time where there is every possibility and no possibility, coexisting. Perhaps I have arrived at the intended destination?
YOM KIPPUR PRAYERS
~ Led by Jill Minkoff at Faith House Living Room, September 23, 2009
from Gates of Repentance, by Joshua Goldman
Who among us is righteous
Enough to say: ‘I have not sinned?’
Born of love to love,
We grow weary,
Heavy with regret,
Sorry for ourselves,
And afraid to know
What might have been.
We have sinned against You, O God, and against each other.
Look now to the cities:
See the broken streets,
Poor and decayed,
And all afraid.
See them and ask:
What have we done?
Help us to turn, O God;
Help us to find forgiveness.
Behold water and air and soil, and see:
Still we beat plowshares into swords,
And make spears out of pruning-hooks.
Disfigured lies the human form divine,
Estranged from its center!
“Your iniquities have separated you from your God.”
The voice grows still;
The search for God is over and gone.
We are alone, all alone,
Our meaning unremembered.
Help us to turn, O God;
Help us to find ourselves;
Help us to learn where to seek You.
Here, now, on Atonement Day
We need not be alone
With our failings.
Let us recall, together,
Blessed moments when clouds parted
And the sun appeared. We looked. We saw.
There was healing and the hope of joy;
We were at peace and knew the joy of hope.
O God, turn us to the heights
Where human goodness finds its dwelling;
Lead us to Your holy mountain,
Your hand stretched for the in welcome
To help us on the way.
Help us on our way, O God;
Lead us on our path.
* * *
We all have committed offenses; together we confess these human sins:
The sins of arrogance, bigotry, and cynicism; of deceit and egotism, flattery and greed, injustice and jealousy. Some of us kept grudges, were lustful, malicious, or narrow-minded. Others were obstinate or possessive, quarrelsome, rancorous, or selfish. There was violence, weakness of will, xenophobia. We yielded to temptation, and showed zeal for bad causes.
* * *
Now may it be Your will, O Lord God of all generations, to forgive all our sins, to pardon all our wrongdoings, and to blot out all our transgressions:
The sin we have committed against You under duress or by choice,
The sin we have committed against You consciously or unconsciously,
And the sin we have committed against You openly or secretly.
The sin we have committed against You in our thoughts,
The sin we have committed against You with our words,
And the sin we have committed against You by the abuse of power.
For all these, O God of mercy, forgive us, pardon us, grant us atonement!
The sin we have committed against You by hardening our hearts,
The sin we have committed against You by profaning Your name,
And the sin we have committed against You by disrespect for parents and teachers.
The sin we have committed against You by speaking slander
The sin we have committed against You by dishonesty in our work,
And the sin we have committed against You by hurting others in any way.
For all these, O God of mercy, forgive us, pardon us, grant us atonement!
