The Light of Faith, Hope, Love, and Peace.

Dear Friends,

While grocery shopping on Friday, with a too full basket trying to fill an empty pantry, I literally bumped into a friend and colleague who is the senior rabbi at a large congregation in Howard County. In his cart was a beautiful cake and a bouquet of flowers. “Hanukah?” I asked, given the blue, white, yellow colors of the cake decorations. “No,” he replied, “First, my wife’s birthday!” We talked for a moment about my trip for our 50^th anniversary, I showed him a few pictures, and we were generally delighted in how family celebrations and our respective holidays collided.

Then Saturday night arrived with the devastating news of the shooting and deaths of 15 people celebrating Hanukah on Bondi Beach in Australia, coupled with the shooting and deaths of students at Brown University in Rhode Island. It was hard to listen as we lit our third candle on the Advent wreath about the light of Christ that has come into the world. In that time of prayer what I mostly thought about was the darkness of the rage and anger that lead people to such terrible acts of violence against people they do not know, who become an enemy to be vanquished, rather than seen for the children of a loving God who values all of us for who we are, warts and all. The irony that all this violence has happened when two of the Abrahamic faith traditions—Christians and Jews are celebrating festivals of divine light and love should not be lost on any of us.

As we near the longest night of the year and light our fourth candle on the Advent wreath I am clinging to the fact that the light of Christ has come into the world. As the Gospel of John tells us this light vanquishes all darkness, even when that darkness does not know this light. What I also know is that as human beings we can embrace that light and the faith, hope, love and peace that are proffered, or we can choose our anger, our rage, our jealousy, and live in the darkness. What gives me hope is knowing that this darkness will be eradicated by God, by “love’s pure light”, as we sing in Silent Night. I also know that I have a responsibility to be that light too, just as a Syrian refugee and Muslim in Australia saw in a moment when he wrested a long gun away from one of the shooters at Bondi Beach. Rather than act in violence he threw the gun away. What act of faith, of hope, of love, of peace will we do in this season to assure the world that light, the true light of God’s love conquers the darkness?

Blessings,

Mary +