Al cheit shechatanu l’fanecha bish’gagah – for the sin we have sinned without even noticing… feeling certain it wasn’t coming from us. We often convince ourselves that the task of these Holy Days is to confront those nagging sins we know we commit – the habits we know we should break, the shame we carry with us for who we know ourselves to be. I would argue that the much higher task of these days is to unearth the sins we haven’t even entered into conversation with, because our self-perception won’t permit it. Perhaps this is what the 20th century rabbinic giant, Joseph Soloveitchik, meant when he taught that “repentance cannot be comprehended rationally; it does not really make sense.” For when we are busy making sense, we are relying on our capacity for reason to talk ourselves into and out of all kinds of things. But while repentance does involve the rational, it also involves the visceral… that “soulful knowing” that I cannot talk myself out of. Our tradition calls it cheshbon ha-nefesh, the reckoning of our souls. And when it comes to racism, the time for our souls’ reckoning has come.
Sadly, there is no law we can pass to change what our eye sees when an African-American is walking toward us on the street at night, nor can any law change what he sees when walking toward us. We can, however, push for every law that prevents whatever assumptions or fears we may carry around with us from turning into legalized injustice. And we have the chance to push for one such law right now. Five days ago, the California State Senate passed AB 953, a bill that would require police officers for the next five years to report basic information from all law enforcement stops, including the officers’ perception of the race of the person they’ve stopped. The data will then be analyzed by a new advisory board that will include social scientists, law enforcement representatives, human and civil rights groups, clergy, and government – and together, they will be able to make policy recommendations to address any findings of racial profiling.
Seems logical enough, right? The bill accuses nobody of anything. It just says, “Let’s find out the facts about racial profiling in our state, so our actions will be based on data, not conjecture.” Pretty hard to argue with that – which is why 67% of Californians support the measure. But it’s now up to Governor Brown to decide if he’ll sign it, and our Reform CA coalition’s meetings with the governor’s staff suggest that getting his signature is a 50-50 proposition at best.
So you know what comes next… and so does the governor. Two years ago, our congregation, along with our Reform CA partners, crashed the governor’s phone lines with more than a thousand calls urging him to sign the TRUST Act, which he had vetoed the year before. With your help, we got it signed. And let me tell you one thing we’ve learned from the governor’s staff… he knows who crashed his phones last time, and he’ll know who you are when you call this time. Tonight, before the breadcrumbs from our Tashlich service wash away into the ocean, you will receive an email message with simple instructions for contacting the governor. We have a real chance here to change the outcome. Please… for the sake of justice… for the sake of making this day about more than words… let’s blitz those phones one more time.
An ancient midrash tells us that the shofar’s cry, which we are about to hear, is supposed to remind us of the crying of Sarah, the first Jewish mom, who wept when she heard about Abraham taking leave of his senses and binding their son Isaac for sacrifice. Of course, she wept only because she feared her son would die. The loved ones of Eric Garner, John Crawford, Michael Brown, Tamir Rice, Walter Scott, Freddie Gray and Sam DuBose were not so fortunate. Nor were the loved ones of the nine souls killed while studying Bible together in Charleston. But let this awful year of bloodshed not confuse us. Every mom of every black child is Sarah… crying the shofar’s cry, fearful that her child will die.
This is our story. Our mission. Our fight. We have not become “just white.” Let the shofar cry. And let our souls hear as they have never heard before.
