Dear Alumni Sheyichyu!
Sholom U’Brocho!
A very Freilichen Yom Tov! Moadim l’Simcha!
Mazel Tov to Rabbi & Mrs. Avremy Kanelsky on the birth of their daughter. Mazel Tov to Rabbi & Mrs. Levi Rabiski on the birth of their daughter. May they bring them up lTOveCHuMAA”T mitoch harchovo, and to be true chayolos! (If anyone is aware of any mazeltov’s that I omitted please let me know).
Thank you as always for the feedback, it is much appreciated.
The time is very short, but I would like to share a few brief thoughts before Yom Tov:
There’s a Jew in Toronto who gets visited by the bochurim on Friday’s for mivtzoim, and they put on teffillin with him. He occasionally visits a Chabad House on Shabbos and Yom Tov as well, and has a warm Yiddishe heart, but, otherwise, is not very observant at this point. Michael (not his real name), recently shared with me the following experience of his:
He recently attended a wedding of a relative. The wedding was a Conservative (or reform etc.) affair, held in a Conservative Temple. He was a close relative, and he took part in everything, even though there were parts that he didn’t particularly care for. However, there was one part of the ceremony that especially disturbed him, and he was still uptight about it when he told it over to me some months later.
As part of the tradition, the ceremony included Sheva Brochos. However, in conforming to their philosophy, there was a very deliberate omission of any reference to G-d.
How can there be brochos without any mention of G-d, I wondered? Who are they blessing? So he explained that they merely said “They should by like trees and grow with many fruit” “They should be happy” etc. without any reference to the Creator.
To me this sounded utterly ridiculous, as it did to him. His feelings were not entirely hidden, which already put him at odds with his family (the baalei hasimcha).
To make matters worse, Michael was honored with a (so-called) “brocho”. Put on the spot, he recited their gibberish; he was, however, deeply insulted. He felt that they should have at least checked with him in advance, and he would have been able to inform them that he wanted no part of their circus.
When he heard one of the (non-Jewish) guests commenting that this was their first time participating in a Jewish wedding, and how beautiful it was etc. Michael could not contain himself, and retorted that while it was undoubtedly a beautiful event, he found no justification to consider it a Jewish one. Indeed, how can a celebration be deemed Jewish if G-d is notably absent (although it will take a little while until Michael is back on good terms with his family).
