Rosh Hashanah Sermon 5786

What Keeps Me Up at Night* 

*(it’s Anxiety)

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Rosh Hashanah is supposed to be sweet. Birthday of the world. Apples and honey. Joy and light.  And yet — if I’m honest — I am anxious. Not the “I had too much coffee” kind. The kind that shows up at 2:00 a.m. when the house is quiet,  and I’m staring at the ceiling,  thinking of my teenager asleep down the hall and wondering what kind of world he will inherit.  Maybe you know that feeling too.

I’m anxious about the world.

The climate is unravelling faster than our policies can keep up. Wars grind on and new ones erupt. Antisemitism around the globe – and most concerning in our neighbourhoods – is rising, and so is hatred of many kinds. People seem lonelier, more brittle, more quick to shout than to listen. We are drowning in information and starving for wisdom. And the scariest part?  It all feels so big. Like trying to hold back the tide with a paper cup. I scroll through the headlines and feel numb. Or angry. Or just… small.

And it’s not just the world that keeps me up at night. I’m anxious about Judaism, too. Not about our tradition itself — that’s beautiful.  I mean our lived Jewishness right now Will our kids want to carry it forward? Will they see it as a source of joy or just a burden? Can our communities stay whole when we disagree so deeply — about Israel, about politics, about who counts and who ought to be included in the tent?

I worry about our DJC community. 

About the fragmentation. About the frustrations. About the silos that sometimes keep us arguing or draw us further apart, when what we need most is each other right now. Our community here in the East End is so special. More than that, it’s important. The community matters. The community matters here. You matter here. Your presence and your voice matter and are needed more than ever.

And what about the old magic —  the music, the wonder, the sacred hush — can it survive our distractions, our exhaustion, our busyness? Sometimes I fear it could all slip through our fingers. I love it so much — the melodies, the candlelight, the way people’s voices braid together in prayer — and that’s what makes me anxious.

I know this might not be what you expected to hear right now.  Right before the shofar service, we usually want soaring words, words that uplift. But here’s the thing: the shofar does not soothe us.  It doesn’t whisper reassurance. It cries out.

It is the raw sound of a human soul saying: “I am scared.” “I am not okay.” “I am awake.”

And maybe you know that sound — the sound your own heart makes when you realize you can’t hold it all. The shofar doesn’t wait for us to have it all together. It blasts anyway. It blasts because this day isn’t about pretending. It’s about truth.

And the truth is, we can’t get to hope without walking through honesty. We can’t return to our truest selves if we won’t name what hurts, what we fear, what feels like it’s coming undone. So today — in these minutes before the shofar — I am trying to let this sacred day hold my anxiety instead of hiding it. Because maybe that’s what The Holy One — or maybe just what being human — asks of us: not to be fearless, but to be honest.

Here’s the thing about anxiety:  it doesn’t come from apathy. It comes from love.

The reason this anxiety cuts so deep is because I care so much. And I imagine you do too —  about the world our children and grandchildren will inherit, about the communities that have held us, about the fragile beauty of life and how easily it can fracture.

I remember one night last winter. It was late. I had finished a meeting and was just scrolling — doomscrolling, if I’m honest.  News of wildfires out west, of rockets in the Middle East, of an antisemitic attack not far from here. I closed my laptop and just sat there in the dark, feeling this swirl of helplessness and grief. And then from down the hall I heard my teenage son Joel’s laughter —  soft, muffled through his door. And it hit me that this is what makes it hurt. Because I want more than safety for him. I want him to inherit wonder.  I want him to have reasons to trust people, to fall in love with this broken world the way I have — not because it’s perfect, but because it’s precious.

And I think that’s what keeps me awake: loving something so much that the thought of losing it is unbearable.

Our tradition knows this feeling: Kohelet says: “With much wisdom comes much grief and sorrow.” The more we see, the more we know, the more our hearts stretch and ache.

The psalmist cries out: “Mima’amakim karati Adonai — from the depths I call to You, Adonai.” 

And the Chasidic masters teach that every person should carry two slips of paper in their pockets: One that says, “For my sake was the whole world created,”  and one that says, “I am dust and ashes.” The work of being human is to hold both truths at once. We are small — and we are infinitely precious. And anxiety, for all its sharp edges, is often just love in disguise.

It also helps me remember that we are not the first generation to lie awake at night. Jews have carried fear and hope side by side for thousands of years. We sang by the rivers of Babylon in exile. We rebuilt after the Temple fell. We whispered the Shema in secret during pogroms and the Inquisition. We lit Chanukah candles in ghettos and camps, believing somehow that light still mattered. And still — here we are. Still praying. Still arguing. Still loving this tradition enough to fight for its future.

Rabbi Jonathan Sacks once said,  “To be a Jew is to be an agent of hope in a world that has too often despaired.” Fear has always been part of our lineage. So has resilience. We come from people who did not look away from what was broken — and who also refused to stop building. If our ancestors could carry both, maybe we can too.

So what do we do with this anxiety?  We don’t have to solve the whole world today.  We don’t have to carry it alone. We just have to take the next small step. It can feel impossible, like the tide will always win. But maybe the work isn’t to stop the tide. Maybe it’s to gather enough people planting seeds. Or building a sea wall stone by stone — or simply holding one another steady when the waves rise. 

Teshuvah is built on this kind of small, real action.  The tradition doesn’t ask us to leap straight to perfection. It asks us to turn. Just one degree. And then another. And then another. We can’t control the news cycle. But we can control whether and how we greet each other — with curiosity instead of judgment. We can control whether we let our children and grandchildren — and all young people in our midst — see us delight in being Jewish, not just worry about it. We can control whether our communities feel like tents or walls.

Hope isn’t naïve. It’s not blind optimism. It’s what Rebecca Solnit calls  “an axe you break down doors with in an emergency.” Hope is not what you feel.  It’s what you do. It’s what WE do together. Every time we show up here — tired, overwhelmed, carrying our fear — and still sing together, still make kiddush and motzi, still comfort the grieving and welcome the stranger — we are practicing hope.

And that practice changes the world.

But here’s the good news: Judaism never leaves us in the valley. It always points toward the mountain. Rosh Hashanah cracks us open. Yom Kippur will ask what we want to pour into that open space. Today, we name what feels fragile, and we let the shofar carry our cries. In ten days, we will gather again and I will tell you what I cling to — the reasons I still believe in us, in Judaism, and in the possibility of healing. But for now —  let’s not run past this moment. Let’s stand together here, hearts trembling, ready to be awakened, ready to live fully in this wakefulness. Because the only way to move forward  is to start exactly where we are.

So now, we breathe. And we listen.  Let the shofar speak for us — our fear, our trembling, our hope —  as we begin again.

Rabbi Ilyse Glickman

Please let me know what you think about today’s offering: rabbiglickman@djctoronto.com. I look forward to the conversation.