Info on the Blog-Flapping at Home Depot

‘Igrot Mei Hof Hayam’-Epistles from the Seashore
Emails from Rabbi Dov Gartenberg
Friday, Aug. 10, 2007 Email V.1;E3

To the folks at TBS and cyberspace,

Introducing Rabbiblog
Thank you for the positive feedback to the Epistles from the Seashore. I will try to keep these coming. I will now be posting them on my blog. It is dangerous for Rabbis to discover new media. We tend to be long winded in general and the blog is well suited for rabbinic windbags. I have for the most part learned the art of keeping my live sermons short (It took two decades of rabbinating to do that) but I am still mastering the blog form. In any case you can log onto my blog which is artfully named, Rabbiblog. I know you will want to bookmark this, so here it is: http://rabbidovblog.blogspot.com/ .

My Purple Period
You can read postings from the last three years. Like artists, rabbis go through periods. Picasso had his blue period and rose period. The last nineteen years was my teal period, a Northwest color, still worn occasionally by the Seattle Mariners during Spring training. The last three years were my hot teal period, a time of creativity and new ideas. I started a new non-profit and experimented with some new rabbinic approaches. You can read about them on the blog. Many of these ideas were generated because I was out of the pulpit and had the opportunity to create without the pressures of a pulpit life. So you will see a different side of my rabbinate.
I think I am entering the purple period, when rabbis have the chance to summon experience, wisdom, and insight from years of service. Purple is the color of the priesthood as well, so I hope I demonstrate the worldly wisdom of the Cohanim. In any case, I hope this recent turn in my career will bode well and will be reflected in the blog. Please feel free to comment, since the blog allows for that. While I cannot promise to respond promptly, I will try to do so to realize its potential for communication.

Sermon Postings
I will also post sermons I write out on the blog for your review. I know most people don’t make it to shul or don’t want to come. But people do tell me they would like to read or hear the sermon. Any sermon I write out I will post here on the blog. I will post them after Shabbat after I have delivered the sermon, but for a special fee I will send out previews so you can decide whether it is worth coming to shul for a live version. (If you think I was serious, don’t read on.)
I am currently doing a series of sermons named after an impressive book by my colleage, Rabbi Alan Lew, the Rabbi Emeritus of Congregation Beth Shalom in San Francisco, (another shul in the Beth Shalom franchise, 100,000 polyester kippot sold!). The book, This is Real and You are Completely Unprepared gives a beautiful interpretation on how to understand the High Holiday period. Rabbi Lew argues that the High Holiday period runs from Tisha B’av, the fast day in mid summer to the end of Sukkot in the fall. In this framework he gives a deeply spiritual understanding of this annual journey we do as Jews. I have been teaching from this book and adding my own insights during this series of Friday evening sermons which will continue through Sukkot. I suggest that you get the book in preparation for your own holidays. I think it will greatly enhance your experience of services and beyond. Look at the emailed or hard copy, Hasofer Lashavua-The Weekly Scribe, for the sermon schedule.

Shabbat Morning Live
On Shabbat mornings I have introduced a new (for TBS) form of rabbinic presentation called a ‘Limud’. Limud means study. I take a few verses from the portion of the week, illuminate their meaning while also bringing one or two texts from the Talmud * or Midrash . I ask questions, encourage comments, and keep the content rich, stimulating, and funny. My main goal is to show the infinitely fascinating world of the rabbis and how they understood life through our great texts. I was very pleased to see the level of participation, especially from the young people.

Flapping Hands
I was in the Home Depot on one of my recent moving shopping ventures and I saw a teenager with his family in the aisle flapping his hands wildly. As I approached I saw the mother take his hands and put them at his side, pleading softly with him to calm down.
I have an autistic son who I love deeply. He does similar things. His name is Mori. I likes to walk tiptoe and to put his forefingers on his temples. He coos out loud and makes funny faces. I grew to be proud of his eccentricities and the strange encounters his expressions would engender. I melt every time I run into an autistic person in a public space. So when I passed by the family, I commented to the mother, “I have one too.” She turned to me and said with some relief, “So you know what it’s like.” I nodded and smiled and we went on our way.
There is a blessing upon seeing a unique individual: “Baruch ….Mshaneh Haberiot. Blessed are You, Adonai, who has made all your creatures different from one another. “ I said it to myself as I passed and meditated on our shared fate as parents of disabled children. Nothing like going to Home Depot to have meaningful human encounters.

I am attaching the talk I gave about Mori the week before his Bar Mitzvah ceremony. This is one of my favorite sermons. I hope you like it too.
May you have a restful and joyful Shabbat,

A Proper Blessing at a Bar Mitzvah
Rabbi Dov Gartenberg
Jan. 25, 2003 Shabbat Yitro

Next week our children, Moriel and Fay will be marking their Bnei Mitzvah at Shabbat morning services. During rehearsal this Sunday we practiced the parental blessings. After chanting the Birkat Hacohanim, we started to chant the Baruch shepatarani blessing over our son, Mori. I realized at that moment that I could not really say this blessing over him. I paused for one moment before turning to Fay and practicing saying it over her.

This blessing, which parents recite over children when they reach the age of Bar or Bat Mitzvah, is Baruch ata adoshem eloheinu melech haolam shepatarani meonsho shelazeh. It is translated in the new RA manual as Praised are You, Adonai our God who rules the universe, who has freed us of some responsibilities and conferred new ones upon this child. Perfectly appropriate for Fay, but not for Mori, who will never have the ability to choose responsibility for the observance of Mitzvot. I wondered, what blessing should we say for Mori?

In Parshat Yitro, we celebrate the giving of the Decalogue and remember that great turning point at Sinai. Jews over the generations regard the giving of the law as God’s greatest gift. Every Bar Mitzvah is a reenactment of that great moment when God brings us into a holy way of life. Our sages understood the gift as a precious burden as well. That is why the Bar Mitzvah blessing is formulated in the negative --shepatarani meonsho shelazeh.-God has exempted us (the parents) from the punishment for his transgressions of the Torah.

It is strange when a parent covets the possibility of punishment as part of the vain hope that a child may gain the capacity for conscience.

It is the transgression of the 10th utterance, thou shalt not covet, that a parent of a severely disabled child commits over and over again. I cannot deny that when I see another child Mori’s age, for a fleeting moment I covet his health, his capacity for making friends, his plans for his future. I covet a family’s relaxed air at a restaurant while I sit nervously afraid that Mori might make a scene over food. Paul, the first Christian, so alienated from his Judaism and so misunderstanding of it, at least had it right about thou shalt not covet. This Mitzvah makes you aware of how deep seated jealous longing is and how painfully difficult it is to consistently fulfill this divine command.

On NPR’s Talk of the Nation this week there was an hour devoted to describing the life of families with autistic children and siblings. I was particularly struck by the observations of callers about how afraid they were to go out in public with their autistic children for fear of embarrassment. The expert on the show observed that families with autistic children often shut themselves in their homes because they feel that no one can understand their autistic child or be sensitive enough to respond to his strange behaviors. I listened as the callers described their own peculiar struggles to make what was familiar to them acceptable to the outside world.

As painful as it is, it is totally understandable when people react negatively to a disabled person’s disruptive behavior or strange appearance. We actually find this attitude in the sources. When determining whether or not a Shoteh, a mentally incapacitated individual, is entitled to monetary compensation for insult, one finds this comment in Baba Kama: “It may be said that the Shoteh by himself constitutes a disgrace which is second to none,” meaning that one who is already disgraced to such a degree is not vulnerable to further degradation, and thus is not entitled to compensation.

But here is what Mori’s presence in my life has brought home to me: I believe that one of our main purposes in this life is to progress from gnut to shevah- the Rabbis’ phrase for describing the narrative progression of the Passover Seder. Translate it as the move from degradation to praise--the journey from disgrace to dignity. One such way for us to provide a semblance of that journey to our son is to allow him to participate in a Bar Mitzvah ceremony.

When my daughter Fay began thinking about her Bat Mitzvah she offered to share her Simcha with her brother, Mori. Mori was already 14 at the time and we had not given serious consideration to having a ceremony for him. How could a person who would never be obligated for Mitzvot have a Bar Mitzvah ceremony? But as we thought about combining their simcha, we imagined that this occasion would not only mark Fay’s becoming a commanded Jew, but give Mori a chance to receive loving attention and praise from his community – to be seen.

Each child with autism is an individual and will be different from other children with the same diagnosis. Like every other autistic child, Mori has a unique personality. He is a very affectionate child. He loves to smile, hug, and kiss those around him. He is most of the time very responsive to requests and instructions. He lets you know what he likes and dislikes. He appears to be happy most of the time. He is also a great mystery to us. We do not know the extent of his self-awareness or even his intelligence. While he appears to be low functioning he constantly surprises us with his capacity to respond to complex commands and to show a wide range of emotional expression.

The decision to include Mori in Fay’s Bat Mitzvah ceremony was not an easy one. But it was guided first by Fay’s willingness to share this with her brother. Siblings of severely disabled kids have a special lot in life. They grow up knowing that their lives are often very different from others. They have to develop special sensitivities and responses that most other young people never have to deal with. I greatly admire Fay’s decision to share her special moment.

We did mull over the issue of a joint ceremony, however. We decided to go ahead with it because we were convinced that Mori had the capacity to participate in the rituals with some degree of intention and cooperation. We have rehearsed every week for over four months and he very early on showed his ability and willingness to perform several parts of the service. Recent problems with his medication have made his cooperation less predictable, but I know one thing for sure: he loves to be on the Bimah.

Another reason guided our decision to carry this out. Because of Mori’s disability he remains hidden to the community and unknown by his peers. His strange behaviors are sometimes misunderstood and among some adolescents held up to ridicule. But Mori, like any other young person, deserves a place of dignity in his community. Like any other child he should be given an opportunity to develop and fulfill his potential as a human being.

Finally we decided to do this as a way to celebrate our unique expanded family. Mori and Fay is only one combination. Mori and Zach is another. Mori and Nancy and Ed, his incredible loving guardians are another. Mori and Joanne and the many loving caregivers and teachers are other special relationships. A Bnai Mitzvah ceremony is a family celebration that takes place within community. . In our case we have a very large, unusual family--natural and adopted, Jewish and non-Jewish--who will mark this holy moment.

On one level I hope next week is not different from any other Bar or Bat Mitzvah. I would just like to shep nachas like every other parent for that ceremony that we wait 13 years for as parents. As Rabbi of a congregation I know that I am at the very center of congregational life. But as a parent of a severely disabled child, I also know what it feels like to be on the margins of community. I also know how difficult it is for any family in our situation to share with others our reality that we more often seek to keep out of view. I hope that my speaking about Mori today will encourage other parents who struggle with the demands of special children to know that our community welcomes their children and gives them a special place in our collective life. I hope that this will inspire our Beth Shalom community to actively reach out to families with disabled children and to educate our young to be caring and loving to children with special needs.

There is a beautiful passage in tractate Megillah quoted in the name of Rabbi Yosi: “For a long time I was perplexed by the verse, “And you shall grope at noonday as the blind gropes in the darkness.” (Deut 28:29) Now what difference does it make to a blind man whether it is dark of light? (I didn’t find out) until the following incident occurred. I was once walking on a pitch black night when I saw a blind man walking in the road with a torch in his hand. I said to him, ‘My son, why are you carrying this torch?’ He replied, ‘As long as I have this torch in my hand people see me and save me from the holes and the thorns and the briars.

Some who are disabled know how to let people know that they need help; they can let themselves be seen. Other disabled people need help from loving people to put the torch in their hands so they can be seen. With that assistance we enable our community to respond with love and compassion to help a disabled person avoid the holes and thorns and the briars in life.

So what should we recite for Mori this coming Shabbat when the time comes to give the parental blessing? I have chosen a different blessing: the one we say when seeing something good in the world: Baruch….. Hatov vhametiv. It will be so good to see Mori outside of the shadow--so good to see him next to his sister and brother, so good to see him amongst his community, so good to let him sit, twitching and shouting, bathed in the love and acceptance of both family and friends.

I appreciate the opportunity to share this part of my life with you. Shabbat Shalom.