Parshat Va'etchanan
Rabbi Jessica Kate Meyer
July 23rd 2021

In the journey from Tisha B’Av to Tu B’Av, we come to understand love differently. In the face of death and destruction and existential fear, we remember how to love each other. 

Defenses down.

Rabbi Jessica Kate Meyer
Parashat Sh’lach

But what about the damage we do to others, and to the world, to God, when we sink into the victim place, make like Gregor Samsa and morph into grasshoppers, not taking the impact of our actions seriously? When there is a discrepancy between perceived impact and actual impact, things get dangerous.

To silence prayer is to silence a soul.
So many bad actors and bad actions have been amplified - spewing hate - while prayer is quieted.
And we know that what gets amplified draws us toward it.

Parashat Tazria-Metzora

Our skin, our boundaries,
must be permeable to receive nutrients from the sun,
from light reflected in one another’s faces, from touch.

Porous enough to breathe in and release out.

Parashat Chol Hamoed

What would you pack in the middle of the night, in hipazon/frenzy? What do you drop at the edge of the sea before crossing?

What are your non-negotiables?

Parashat Vayikra

Even when we think we’re standing on the outside looking in,

even when we can’t hear the divine voice calling our name,

we use our own voice to call someone else’s.

The act of inviting brings us all inside.

Parashat Terumah

If the space between the wings of the כרובים were too close, obscuring the Divine Presence titrating through the schach, the keruvim themselves would become idols--masechot--as heretical as the golden calf. Key difference? The schach.

Parashat Toldot