In the late 1990’s, a shopping center opened in the city of Chadeira in Eretz Yisrael. One of the establishments was a bowling alley that was to be open on Shabbos.
The local religious community was up in arms and launched a campaign to put an end to the Shabbos desecration, but no amount of letters, protests, or other efforts succeeded in swaying the bowling alley’s owners.
Everything changed, though, when a group of children from a Lev L’Achim school for newly religious children held a birthday party in the bowling alley. Their display of proper middos and their heartfelt bentching melted the opposition of the bowling alley’s owner, and she ultimately closed her business on Shabbos and enrolled her own child in the school.
Where attempts to educate, persuade, and even protest failed, the example set by a group of children succeeded in penetrating an irreligious woman’s emotional armor.
Teaching by example can be many times more powerful than teaching through lectures and speeches. Thus, the kiddush Hashem brought about when the Jewish nation follows the Torah can be far greater than the effects of the most massive educational initiative.
Reproduced from Living Kiddush Hashem by Rabbi Shraga Freedman with permission of the copyright holders, ArtScroll/Mesorah Publications, Ltd.
