Connecting in a Disaster

At about 3:30 pm on Monday, our house in White Plains, New York lost TV and Internet service. We still had lights, and just a few minutes later, they came back on. We were hopeful.

But then, at about 6:30, I got a call from our landlord — he lost power.

Then, at about 7 pm, I started seeing Facebook statuses from people nearby saying, “No power.” So I knew it would just be a matter of time.

And indeed, about half an hour later, our lights flickered, flickered, and then went totally kaput. We joined the millions upon millions of people who lost power during Hurricane Sandy.

By Tuesday, our cell phone was running low on power, and our service was spotty at best. And we wondered — while we could hear the news through our battery-powered radio, if we had no internet and no phone, how would we connect with others? I felt very isolated — I wanted both to hear what was going on, and I wanted to tell others I was all right.

During the storm, people were certainly following the news, but even more, they were following their friends’ news. As Clay Shirky notes in Cognitive Surplus, our definition of “media” has changed — it’s no longer the one-way monologue of TV and radio; it’s now the conversation (both online and offline) that connects us with others.

I, too, felt a need to not only hear what others were going through, but to share my experience, as well. And what was fascinating was that I seemed to use the exact same words that so many people used to describe what was happening to them.

Facebook even provided their top ten status updates during the storm, and they probably sound a lot like what you saw or wrote:

1. we are ok
2. power – lost power, have power, no power
3. damage
4. hope everyone is ok
5. trees
6. made it
7. safe
8. thankful
9. fine
10. affected

Those phrases convey not only information, but emotion, as well. As Rabbi Rebecca Schorr taught us, these words remind us that we share not only information but experiences with others — both joyous and scary. We have a need not only to know what is going on, but to share important events with others.

And what has inspired me the most (especially as someone who still has no power) is seeing neighbors, churches, synagogues, libraries and community organizations reaching out to others saying, “We have power — come to us.”

Indeed, while we hope that our life is easy, with few storms to toss us around, when disasters do happen, we truly see our ability and our need to connect with others. And even more striking, we see just how much it brings out the best in everyone.

Here’s hoping everyone is able to find a place of warmth, light and safety.

The Expansiveness of Joy on Sukkot

Think about an activity you love to do that gives you a good challenge. Maybe it’s playing tennis. Maybe it’s sailing. Maybe you’re like me, and it’s working on the Saturday New York Times crossword.

Whatever it is, when you’re deeply involved in that activity, you’re in a state that’s known as “flow” — a state of pure enjoyment. Time seems to run at a different speed, you’re totally focused on your task, and afterwards, you feel a real sense of accomplishment.

“Flow” was first described by psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, and he argues that flow arises when we find challenges that are just ahead of our skills. And beyond the fact that being in flow just feels really good — it’s a state of pure enjoyment — there’s another very important aspect to it: flow pushes our skills to a new level.

If you are a tennis player, for example, you had to work your way up from getting the ball over the net (or not hitting it so hard so that it went over the fence) to improving your serve to nailing your backhand. Each new challenge was also an opportunity to improve your ability.

As Csikszentmihalyi phrased it:

Pleasure is an important component of the quality of life, but by itself it does not bring happiness. Sleep, rest, food, and sex provide restorative homeostatic experiences that return consciousness to order after the needs of body intrude and cause psychic entropy to occur. But they do not produce psychological growth. They do not add complexity to the self. Pleasure helps to maintain order, but by itself cannot create new order in consciousness…

[In contrast,] enjoyable events occur when a person has not only met some prior expectation or satisfied a need or a desire but also gone beyond what he or she has been programmed to do and achieved something unexpected, perhaps something even unimagined before.

Enjoyment is characterized by this forward movement: by a sense of novelty, of accomplishment. (Csikszentmihalyi, Flow, 46)

In other words, joy expands who we are. And that’s a message we need to remember for Sukkot.

Sukkot, along with Passover and Shavuot, are called the “three pilgrimage festivals” because they were the three holidays when all the Israelites were commanded to come to the ancient Temple in Jerusalem. Each of the holidays also has their own name in our liturgy. Passover, understandably, is called “the time of our freedom.” Shavuot, which marks the giving of the Torah, is naturally called “the time of the giving of our Torah.” Sukkot’s title, however, is a little more mystifying — it is called “the time of our joy.” Why is that?

There are any number of reasons, but one of the explanations recalls an ancient tradition from Temple times. On Sukkot, there was a ceremony called “the drawing of water,” and the Rabbis taught, “One who has not witnessed the celebration of the water-drawing ceremony has never seen real joy.” (Sukkah 51a)

What was that “real joy”? Well, according to the Mishnah, people danced and sang, and the wisest and most pious men would juggle torches. While that sight would certainly make people smile and be happy, I think there’s a deeper lesson.

Because Sukkot was one of the three pilgrimage festivals, the population of Jerusalem would increase dramatically, so before the holiday, the priests and Levites would make major renovations to the outer courtyard. They would add some extra balconies, and the courtyard ended up being a little bigger than about the size of a football field.

But lots of people were coming for the holiday. Lots of people. Probably more than what the courtyard could handle. If you want an image, think of MetLife Stadium, but instead of everyone being in the stands, everyone is on the field. But, the Rabbis said, “Miraculously, tens of thousands of people were able to crowd in.”

Now, since thousands of people were coming, they certainly may have been a little physically cramped. But these thousands of people were not coming at any time. Instead they were coming at a specific time — Sukkot, “the time of our joy.” And joy has a miraculous quality to it, because when we are feeling joy, we can somehow always find room for more.

Think about this way: if you have a child, when your child was born, you didn’t say, “Well, since I have only 100 points of love, let me now figure out who I’ll love less.” No! Instead, the joy you felt caused your heart to grow. Miraculously, that joy led you to find room for more holiness, more specialness and more love than you ever thought possible.

Indeed, as Csikszentmihalyi taught us about being in flow, when we are doing anything that gives us real joy, we are learning new things and we are pushing ourselves. We discover that joy helps us grow —  and that there is no limit to its expansiveness.

So on this Sukkot, may we strive to create a little more joy in this world. We’ll find the room.

Teaching Our Tongue to Say “I Don’t Know”

These were the words I shared on Yom Kippur morning at Temple Beth El of Northern Westchester. G’mar chatimah tovah!
—
In the spring of 2006, Stuart Firestein, who is now the chair of the Columbia University biology department, had an idea for a new course he wanted to teach, and he wanted to invite a few guest lecturers to come and speak. But he was a little worried about how his colleagues might respond. Why? Because this course was going to be called “Ignorance,” and as he said, it was going to be a little dicey trying to recruit a colleague by saying, “Hello, Albert, I’m running a course on ignorance, and I think you’d be perfect.” (Firestein, Ignorance, 5)

What Firestein discovered, though, was that his colleagues actually found it very exciting to talk about everything they didn’t know and all the open questions in their fields, such as: do animals have self-awareness? Where does consciousness from? Why is there something instead of nothing? Firestein was reminded that “[while k]nowledge is a big subject, [i]gnorance is bigger [a]nd it is [also] more interesting…” (Firestein, 10-11) Indeed, we often don’t realize the full value of not knowing.

Instead, we tend to crave knowledge and certainty, and it’s easy to see why. It is a complicated world and we lead complicated lives, and as Rabbi Brad Hirschfield teaches: “We long to be certain of how to live, to know that we have found the right thing to which to commit ourselves…” But, as Hirschfield continues, we also see how certainty blinds us to other perspectives, and why we then see “fundamentalists…die-hard Democrats or Republicans, liberals and conservatives shouting back and forth at each other, ranting secularists, [and] raving holy rollers…” (Hirschfield, You Don’t Have to Be Wrong for Me to Be Right, 39-40) Ask any teacher who deals with students turning to the back of the book in order to pass a test, and they’ll tell you that “knowing” can be a big problem, because “knowing” prevents “learning.” And so perhaps that’s why the Rabbis urged us to do something very challenging – to “teach [our] tongue to say ‘I don’t know.’” (Berakhot 4a)

Why did the Rabbis urge us to embrace our ignorance? Because those three words can open up our souls, open up our hearts, and open up our minds. When we say “I don’t know” when it comes to our souls, we soon discover new ways to talk about and experience God, are reminded to have humility when we speak about the Infinite. When we say “I don’t know” when it comes to our hearts, we soon discover new ways to interact with others, meeting another person with a level of sincerity and depth that we hadn’t experienced before. And when we say “I don’t know” when it comes to our minds, we soon discover new insights and new wisdom, and we find the joy in expanding our horizons.

Let’s begin by seeing how the words “I don’t know” can nourish our souls, because the words “I don’t know” can help us find language to talk about God. One of my passions is examining the interaction of religion and science, and so I end up talking to a lot of atheists. They share with me how they see religious people ignoring science, and thus halting progress on issues such as climate change, gay rights, and reproductive freedom. Or they note that the Bible was a Bronze-Age text, and so we need to move beyond its creation myths and often-barbaric morality. Or they explain that while scientific knowledge can always potentially be overturned by new data, religion forces us to perform mental gymnastics in order to hold onto dogmatic beliefs.

These arguments in favor of science are absolutely valid, but their arguments against religion are less so, because they rail against a particular vision of religion. Religion is a human endeavor – it is a tool, and like any tool, it can be used or misused, depending on how it is applied. So the question becomes how use religion, and it arises from how talk about God. There is a difference between what I refer to as a “top-down theology” and a “bottom-up theology.” A “top-down” theology is an inherently arrogant one, because it begins with the premise, “I know with certainty what God is and what God wants.” This is the vision of religion that atheists – and probably most of us – resist, because it is the form of religion that holds back civil and human rights, ignores scientific fact, and tries desperately to maintain its own power.

But there is another way we can talk about God – one that has a recognition that we will never fully know what God may or may not be. It’s what I would call a “bottom-up” theology, because it begins with our own personal life experiences. The premise here is, “I can’t prove anything about God one way or another. But I do know that I am here on this earth, and that I have a responsibility to myself and to others. I have fears and I have hopes. And so maybe it’s not about ‘proving’ or ‘disproving’ God, but about experiencing God, which happens when I search for meaning and purpose, and make a positive impact on others.” We all hold beliefs – about the world, about how we should behave, about who we are. These beliefs may or may not be provable, but that is less important than exploring how they influence our actions. As Rabbi David Wolpe taught: “Faith is not an idea but a way to live, not a logical proposition but an outcome of encountering a noble soul….I [am] less concerned with what God might be than with what faith in God might make of me.” (Wolpe, Why Faith Matters, 18-20, italics mine)

Without a doubt, religion continues to cause problems in our world. But it causes problems when its certainty leads arrogance, when it claims to “know” for sure who or what God is and what God wants from us. But if, instead, we can teach our tongue to say “I don’t know” when we talk about God, we can focus on how we respond to the simple awe and mystery of living. We can talk about our search for connection and meaning, and how we will ensure that our lives will have value. We can realize that the process of grappling with these questions will strengthen our souls. And it will remind us, in the words of Rabbi Laura Geller, that “all theology is [really] autobiography,” and that we are all on our own personal journey.

And that leads to the way that teaching our tongue to say “I don’t know” can open our hearts, because it teaches us how to truly listen to one another’s life story. Too often, we make assumptions about other people. We hear that someone is a Democrat or a Republican, a liberal or a conservative, an evangelical Christian or an atheist, and we think that those labels tell us all we need to know about them. But one of the tenets of Judaism is that each individual person is created in the image of God, and each individual person is unique. “A human king stamps out many coins with one die, and they are all alike,” the Mishnah says, “but God stamped each person with the seal of Adam, and not one of them is like his or her fellow.” (Sanhedrin 4:5) Yes, we all experience hopes and fears, but what gives us hope and what frightens us will be different from person to person. And the only way to truly connect with others is to seek to understand what we don’t yet know about them.

One of my friends and colleagues, Joshua Stanton, is the founding co-editor of the Journal of Inter-Religious Dialogue, and he has had the opportunity to work closely with one of the giants in the interfaith world, a man named Eboo Patel. Patel is an Indian Muslim who believes that religion can do great things, but in order for that to happen, we all need to learn how to be both grounded in our own religious tradition and open to other perspectives. So Patel founded the Interfaith Youth Core, in the hopes of inspiring young people to strengthen their knowledge, attitudes and relationships among different faiths. Patel was on President Obama’s Advisory Council on Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships, and has spoken about the need for stronger interfaith work at a TED conference, the Clinton Global Initiative, and even the Nobel Peace Prize Forum.

I asked my friend Josh what he has learned from Patel, and he shared with me this story:

About a year ago, Eboo decided to take a group of [us]…out to dinner. He chose a casual (but delicious!) pizza place on the Upper West Side… Just that month he had gone to meet with the President [and] shared the podium with countless national and international leaders…In all of these areas, he had been…speaking, sharing his ideas, and persuading others with words to engage in important deeds.

But that night, he was quiet. Very quiet, in fact. Sitting with [us], he asked “What are you doing that means most to you?”… Then, he went around listening to all of our responses…
It felt strange being in the presence of a world-class leader, who was more interested in hearing about our lives than in teaching us about his own…

So I ask[ed] him why it was that he was being so taciturn. He responded: “Every day, people ask me to talk. Every day, I have to express my ideas. But I learn most when listening…If we are to have real engagement of young people in the interfaith movement, then I first need to stop and listen.”

In essence, Eboo was saying that he needed to learn before he could teach; that we were the focus of his work, not merely another target audience for his words; that we were the experts of our own lives, and that he needed to stop and listen, because he didn’t know about our lives and the world in which we lived quite like we did. In order to foster the next generation of religious leaders, he first had to respond to his understanding that he didn’t know – at least not as well as he might, after listening to each of our stories. (personal correspondence with Joshua Stanton)

There is far too much talking and far too little listening in our world today. Whether that’s on 24-hour news shows, Facebook feeds, or even in our relationships with each other, we tend to be much more interested in sharing our own perspective than in hearing another’s. But real people are not caricatures – real people are complex, challenging, and multi-faceted. So if we can step back and say, “I don’t know you as well as I perhaps should,” then we open our hearts, and create deeper and more meaningful relationships.

There is a third and final way we can find value in teaching our tongue to say “I don’t know,” and that is how it opens our minds. When we do a Google search or peruse on Wikipedia and see just how much we don’t know, then our natural curiosity can drive us to learn something new. While we often think of education and learning as occurring when we’re young, the truth is, we are constantly learning – and we can never stop. Our world is changing so rapidly, and as Alvin Toffler, a man whose expertise is on what the future will bring, argues, “In the future, illiteracy will not be defined by those who cannot read and write, but by those who cannot learn and relearn.” (quoted in Thomas Friedman, “New Rules,” 9/9/12)

That outlook is actually a very Jewish one, because more than Judaism has celebrated knowledge, it has truly honored learning. As Rabbi Bradley Artson teaches:

Learning is not a possession, something to have. It is a process of growth and unfolding that is a permanent accompaniment to human life. Mistakenly viewing learning as a form of conquest leads to the gradual loss of competence in a given field – that is why so many professions require continuing education to be able to remain active…Knowledge and wisdom do not merely grow stale; they dissipate if not freshened every day. (The Bedside Torah, 238)

Judaism is not a religion that proclaims it has the answers. Instead, Judaism is a religion that strives to help us ask good questions, because it is questions and not answers that truly expand our learning.

And so this year, under the guidance of our adult education committee, chaired by Maxine Olson, we have sought to expand the learning here at Temple Beth El. Downstairs in the Great Hall, you will find our program book for our new Campus of Living Judaism, which has the details on all the ways we can learn together. If you want, you can learn with clergy over breakfast on Sunday mornings with our “Food for Thought” classes. In the fall, we will be asking, “Should Religion Influence Politics?”, in the winter we will be exploring, “Can You Be Jewish Without God?” and in the spring, we will be examining what it would mean to have “An Ethical Economy.” Or, if you’d like, you can have private dinners with several well-known and up-and-coming authors. Or, if you prefer, you can hear about the state of the world from experts like Rabbi Jonathan Sacks and Israeli Ambassador Michael Oren through our 92nd St. Y simulcasts.

Additionally, on the right-hand panel of your service insert, you will see these and other adult learning opportunities. As we do on Rosh Hashanah, I’d ask you to notch off any topics that might spark your interest. Maybe it’s a subject that excites you, or maybe it’s an issue that you’d like to learn a new perspective on, or maybe it’s a refresher on something that didn’t totally stick from Hebrew school. You’ll be doing it anonymously, and so at the end of the service, I’d ask you to place your notched service inserts into the boxes at the back of the sanctuary. We hope you’ll find these opportunities inspiring and thought-provoking – and if there’s something we’re missing that you want to see, be sure to let us know!

Because ultimately, we are all simply struggling with the questions of life: how do we act? How do we strengthen our relationships? How do we find joy and fulfillment in our lives? How do we repair our world? We have to remember that we can’t be looking to “know the answer” to those questions, because those questions aren’t ones where we can simply look in the back of the textbook. Instead, if we can teach our tongue to say “I don’t know,” then we can find humility, and openness, and curiosity. We can remember that it’s not about “knowing the answers,” but about “creating our responses” – to God, to others, and to ourselves.

Adonai Eloheinu v’Elohei avoteinu v’imoteinu, Adonai our God and God of our ancestors – we live in a world with many unanswered questions. And while we may desire the ease of simple answers, of certainty, of knowing, remind us of the value of teaching our tongue to say those three crucial words: “I don’t know.” Because those words can open up our minds, leading us to strive to continue learning. Those words can up open our hearts, leading us to deeply connect with others. And most of all, those words can open up our souls, leading us to grow in goodness, in holiness and in wholeness and peace.

Amen and g’mar chatimah tovah.

It’s Not About Being Happy — It’s About Doing Good

These the words I shared on Sunday evening for Rosh Hashanah. Shanah tovah all — may it be a good and sweet new year.

—

There are two Hebrew words that we say many, many times over these High Holy Days. They express a wonderful sentiment to use when we greet others – whether in the sanctuary, in the parking lot or with friends and family – because they reflect our hopes for this New Year.

Those two Hebrew words are, of course, shanah tovah. And yet we almost always mistranslate them.

Perhaps it’s because we Jews celebrate two “new years” – Rosh Hashanah and January 1st – that the English greeting we tend to use is “happy new year.” But that’s not what shanah tovah means. “Shanah tovah” has almost nothing to do with happiness. Instead, “Shanah tovah” really means “a good year,” and there is a difference between our year being a “happy” one and our year being a “good” one. And I would argue that we shouldn’t focusing on “being happy.” Instead, we should focus on “doing good.”

Now, I can already hear an objection: Don’t we want to be happy? Is there anyone here who would wish for less happiness this year? Well, of course, if we had the choice, we would obviously rather be happy than be sad. But it also depends on what we mean by the word “happy.” Generally, we define “happiness” as “a pleasurable feeling,” but here’s the thing – feelings come and feelings go. So yes, we all hope that this year will have many moments of pleasure. But we also know that this year will bring moments of sadness. Of anxiety. Of struggles. In fact, there is even significant research that shows that we have only a limited amount of control over how happy we actually are.

Sonya Lyubomirsky, professor of psychology and author of the book The How of Happiness, tells us that there are three main factors that determine our happiness level. The first part is genetic – our “happiness set point,” as it’s called. Just as some people’s genes make them taller or shorter than others, genetics play a role in our psychological make-up, as well, which naturally influence what our “baseline happiness” tends to be. According to the research, our genetic tendencies make up about half of our happiness level – and so half of our happiness is something we have no absolutely control over.

The second part of the happiness equation is life circumstances – are we partnered or single? How much money do we have? Are we healthy or ill? These are the areas where we tend to invest a lot of our time, energy, and resources. We try to put money into savings. We go to the gym. We try to eat better. Yet even a cursory reflection on last year shows us just how much luck is involved in our attempts to change our circumstances. We may have tried to save money – but found that landing a job was surprisingly difficult. We may have gone to the gym and eaten better – but were sideswiped by an illness we never saw coming. We can do our best to try to improve our circumstances, but we know that in this area, as well, we have only limited influence.

But what’s surprising is that it turns out that life circumstances make up about only 10% of our happiness level. While there is always an initial shock when our circumstances change dramatically – both for good and for ill – within a few months, their power generally lessens. Why is that? Because we humans have what’s called “hedonic adaptation,” which is just a fancy way of saying “whatever it is, we tend to get used to it.” Author and behavioral economist Dan Ariely explains it well:

If you’ve ever gone to a matinee and walked from the dark movie theater to the sunny parking lot, the first moment outside is one of stunning brightness, but then your eyes adjust relatively quickly…

[Similarly, w]hen we move into a new house, we may be delighted wiSth the gleaming hardwood floors or upset about the garish lime green kitchen cabinets. After a few weeks, those factors fade into the background. A few months later we aren’t as annoyed by the color of the cabinets, but at the same time, we don’t derive as much pleasure from the hardwood floors.

Just as our eyes adjust to changes in light and environment, we can adapt to changes in expectation and experience. (Ariely, The Upside of Irrationality, 158-159, 168-169)

So while we may try to change our circumstances in 5773 in order to “be happy,” we have to remember that not only do have only a finite amount of control, and not only would we need to invest significant time and effort in changing them, even if we do succeed, they will only minimally affect our level of happiness.

So if 50% is genetics and 10% is life circumstances, what’s the other 40%? It turns out that the remaining 40% of our happiness consists of simple actions that we choose to do. What are those actions? They’re ones you would probably expect to hear: Express gratitude. Practice acts of kindness. Be fully present in your actions and with those around you.

And what’s interesting is that through these behaviors, we re-orient how we perceive this year. While these actions do make up 40% of what makes us happy – what make us “feel good” – they are almost 100% of what it means for us to “do good.” Expressing gratitude, practicing acts of kindness, being fully present – these types of actions make both us and our world a little bit better. So as we look towards 5773, we shouldn’t be asking the question “will it be a happy new year?” Research suggests that a large part of that equation is outside of our direct control. So instead, we should be asking, “how will we do good this year?”

Now, if this sounds a little bit like “moral self-help”…it kind of is. And that may not such a bad thing. Earlier this week, Megan McArdle, a journalist for Newsweek and the Daily Beast, wrote a piece entitled “What’s Wrong With Self-Help Books?” She notes that people often denigrate them, because

[t]he lessons they offer are obvious – be nice to your spouse, save more, give constructive feedback to your team members, eat less and exercise more.  And of course this is true, not through any particular fault of the authors, but because there are very few revolutions in human affairs.  The basic facts of living, getting along with others, and dying haven’t actually changed all that much since they were first discussed in blockbuster self-help titles like The Bible.

But that doesn’t mean they don’t bear repeating…[And s]ome messages can only be heard when [we] are ready. (McArdle, “What’s Wrong with Self-Help Books?”, The Daily Beast, 9/13/12)

Similarly, the messages of the High Holy Days are ones we hear all the time: reflect on our actions from this past year. Be kind to others. Be kind to ourselves. Make restitution for the mistakes we made. Forgive. These are messages we hear each year because these are messages that bear repeating.

But perhaps even more important than the words we speak is the way that Rosh Hashanah forces us to do what’s called cheshbon hanefesh – an accounting of our soul. A joke among many people who work in the Jewish world is the hope that the holidays will be postponed or even cancelled because “we’re just not quite ready for them.” But that’s the point – whether we are ready for them or not, the purpose of the High Holy Days is to put ourselves in a particular mindset. They are designed to confront us with the question, “What are the messages that we truly need to hear, and are finally ready to heed?”

And centuries of Jewish wisdom have accumulated many messages about how we do good. Indeed, Judaism’s vision of “self-help” isn’t about “helping ourselves” – it’s about how we help others and make this world better. As Dr. Byron Sherwin and Dr. Seymour Cohen explain in their book Creating an Ethical Jewish Life:

Rather than demonstrating how to accumulate wealth for [ourselves], Jewish ethical literature deals with how wealth may be employed for the benefit of others. Rather than offering strategies about how to manipulate others to do [our] will, it focuses on how best to live a life correlative with the divine will. Rather than teaching [us] how to deliver a speech, it is preoccupied with how to speak without harming others… (Sherwin and Cohen, xi)

So we don’t judge this year on how we felt. We don’t judge it on whether we were “happy” or not. Instead, as our machzor tells us, “the Shofar’s sound [should] awaken the voice of conscience…” (Gates of Repentance, 64-65) We should judge this year on the “good” we can do; how we can build, maintain, and repair our relationships – to ourselves, to each other and to God.

If we can do that, if we focus on “doing good,” then we can also rethink what “being happy” might actually look like. While one definition of “happiness” is feeling good, Russ Harris, author of the book The Happiness Trap, reminds us that true, deep, lasting happiness isn’t about the fleeting moments of pleasure. As he says,

[w]hen we take action on the things that truly matter deep in our hearts, move in directions that we consider valuable and worthy, clarify what we stand for in life and act accordingly, then our lives become rich and full and meaningful, and we experience a powerful sense of vitality. This is not some fleeting feeling – it is a profound sense of a life well lived. (Harris, 5)

In the end, that’s what these High Holy Days are about. We are not looking for a happy new year, but a good new year – and that means “a year of goodness.” We need to concentrate our attention and actions on what “we consider valuable and worthy” and lead us to “clarify what we stand for in life, and act accordingly.” And because it is natural and easy for us to go through the days and months of the year without reflecting on our actions, Rosh Hashanah forces us to consider the kind of life we are building, and to ask ourselves not how we can “be happy,” but how we can “do good.”

Adonai Eloheinu v’elohei avoteinu v’imoteinu, Adonai our God and God of our ancestors, as we reflect on this past year and look towards the new one, remind us to be grateful for the joyous moments and simple pleasures we experience. Remind us of the kind of life we should be living, so that it is a life of compassion and of justice. And remind us that we should evaluate this year in terms not on how happy we felt, but on how we helped improve ourselves and our world. As our machzor says, “We look ahead with hope, giving thanks for the daily miracle of renewal. For the promise of good to come.” (Gates of Repentance, 52) May the promise of 5773 be that we bring a little more goodness into our selves, to others and our world.

Amen, and shanah tovah – may it be a good year for all of us.

How Deep Are Our Thoughts?

For our first anniversary, my wife and I went on a trip through the Southwest, seeing Sedona, Albuquerque, Santa Fe, Taos and Los Alamos. But the highlight for us was walking up to Mather Point at the Grand Canyon as Friday evening turned into Shabbat.

While I had seen the Grand Canyon when I was seven, I had no real recollection of it. When someone I know had gone to the Grand Canyon when he was 15, he had been outwardly unimpressed, remarking “It’s just a big hole in the ground.” But when we walked up to edge of the Canyon, I had no idea just how massive, impressive and beautiful it is. We stood, awe-struck, at the ways the Colorado River had cut into stone over millions of years, and with that image in front of us, we welcomed Shabbat. And the line that kept coming back to me was a verse from Psalm 92, a song for Shabbat: “How great are Your works, Adonai, how very deep are Your thoughts.”

Obviously, exclaiming “how great are Your works” was a natural reaction to having seen something as impressive as the Grand Canyon. But in truth, the word I couldn’t get out of my head was “deep.” The majesty of nature often inspires awe, and the “go-to” images are often sunsets, beaches and mountains. But what makes the Grand Canyon so mind-blowing is how you can see the intricacies of the layers of rock, and you realize that every time you see it from a new angle or at a different time of the day, you see something brand new.

It is amazing to me that something as complex as the Grand Canyon was the result of the flow of the Colorado River. And the Yavapai Geology Museum explained how that could happen. A placard in the museum noted that while rocks are imposing, impressive and seemingly eternal, they are no match against the power of water. Instead, it is the persistence of water deepens what we able to see.

This immediately reminded me of the story about Rabbi Akiva, one of the greatest scholars in Jewish history. According to legend, by the age of 40, he had not learned anything. One time he was standing at the mouth of a well, and asked “Who hollowed out this rock?” He realized that it was the constantly dripping of water, and so he said to himself: “Just as the soft [water] shaped the hard [stone], words of Torah — which are as hard as iron — all the more so they will shape my heart which is but flesh and blood.” (Avot de Rabbi Nathan 6) In other words, a slow accumulation of knowledge deepened his learning, and deepened his ability to understand.

So when the Psalm says “how very deep are Your thoughts,” it teaches us how important it is to “think deeply” about things. It is far too easy for us to skim headlines and ignore context, to regurgitate ideas without considering them critically, and to find support only for perspectives we already buy into.

Instead, we have a responsibility to go in depth. And when we do, we have an opportunity to continually discover more nuance, more complexity, and more beauty than we ever could have imagined.

 

Jonah Lehrer and the Betrayal of Trust in the Internet Age

Jonah Lehrer was one of my favorite authors. I found his writing style engaging and his content thought-provoking, but what I loved most was his ability to explain complicated scientific studies in ways that laypeople could understand.

Because my focus is on the interaction of science and religion, and in particular, how cognitive science can inform who we are as human beings, I constantly drew on his work, and quoted him in multiple posts. He was a great explainer and popularized some very complex and important ideas.

So when I read that he had fabricated and willfully misinterpreted quotations in his book Imagine (which I had read only a month and a half ago), I felt betrayed. Yes, I know that it’s important to be a critical thinker of what I read, and to have a healthy skepticism of any information I may come across. But since I don’t have an academic background in cognitive science, it would have been very hard for me to even know what questions to ask, or precisely how to examine the studies Lehrer talked about.

Instead, I simply had to trust him and trust his integrity. Unfortunately, as I found out on Monday, I couldn’t.

Beyond my personal feelings of betrayal, however, there’s a deeper issue that I’ve been thinking about these last few days: the importance of trust in the internet age.

Many people are mystified as to how Lehrer could have thought that his lies would go undetected. In an article on Salon.com, Roxane Gay wondered: “In the age of the Internet, when everything is just a click away, how did Lehrer think he wouldn’t get caught…when he simply lied over and over?” Indeed, truthfulness is a sine qua non for bloggers and writers who want to be respected, simply because if they don’t check their facts, eventually somebody else will.

But while crowdsourcing has made it infinitely easier and faster to uncover lies, there is now so much information out there that it’s impossible for us to personally verify each and every thing we read. And today, if we come across something intriguing, we go beyond simply reading it — we immediately share it, tweet it, draw on it, remix it, and build off of it. The only reason we do that is because we implicitly trust the accuracy of that information.

And as soon as we link our name with someone else, we link our credibility to theirs, as well.

Indeed, in the internet age, we are all not only consumers of content, but producers of it, as well. Anything we say or share might become the basis of others’ work, and more likely than not, they will simply have to trust that we are telling the truth.

That’s why the Rabbis highlighted an intriguing characteristic about the Hebrew words for “lie” and “truth.” In Hebrew, the word for “lie” is “sheker” — shin, qoph, resh. The shape of those three letters are balanced on thin footing, and are precariously balanced.

In contrast, the word for “truth” is “emet” — aleph, mem, tav. The shape of those three letters rest on more firm footing, and have stronger bases.

So in the Babylonian Talmud, the Rabbis looked at those letters and asked, “Why does falsehood [stand] on one foot, while truth has a brick-like foundation? Because,” they answered, “truth can stand, but falsehood cannot.”

Ultimately, in the internet age, everything we say becomes a potential building block for others to use, and the only way to ensure a solid foundation based on trust is to be truthful.

And as Jonah Lehrer learned, lies will topple your world.

What Playing Games Can Teach Us About Prayer

While I certainly use my iPhone to check my e-mail and make calls, far and away, what really drains my battery are apps like Cut the Rope, Dark Nebula, and Words with Friends. Like almost everyone else on the planet, I simply love playing games.

But why? What is it about games that draw people in?

According to psychologist Alison Gopnik, it’s because the best games place us right into a sweetspot in the interaction between two poles — structure and creativity.

Sometimes, structure stifles creativity. That’s why Tic-Tac-Toe gets so boring so quickly, because there’s no space for imagination.

But for the most dynamic games, the rules can actually enhance our ability to be creative.

One of my favorite examples comes in a podcast from WNYC’s Radiolab, where co-hosts Jad Abumrad and Robert Krulwich interview chess expert Fred Friedel. Friedel wrote a computer program listing every chess move that has ever been played in any tournament. It’s called “Fritz.”

Now, whenever you play a game of chess, your first move has probably been done millions of times. After all, just about everyone starts with one of their pawns moving forward. But as the game progresses, the number of previous times a board position has occurred gets fewer and fewer and fewer. It goes from the millions to the thousands to the hundreds to the tens to the single digits.

Eventually, there comes a moment in the game that has never happened in tournament history. As Friedel describes it, the board is “in a position that has never occurred in the universe.” And when the game gets to that moment, as Abumrad and Krulwich tell us, it feels like “you get a peek at something infinite.”

What’s fascinating is that “a peek at something infinite” is not only something that happens in games. A “peek at something infinite” is truly the goal of prayer. And we get that glimpse when we find improvisation, imagination and creativity within the limits of a clearly defined set of rules. As Krulwich says, “[A game] has a small field of play, but then you step into it, and…whoosh!”

We want that “whoosh!”, but in order to get there, we need guidelines. As Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel argues, when it comes to prayer, spontaneity is the goal, but continuity is the way. And so Jewish prayer at its best has much in common with the best games — they both live in that space where structure helps us engender wonder and imagination.

In Judaism, prayer involves those two components — keva, the fixed words and set times we should pray, and kavannah, the intentionality and inspiration prayer is supposed to create. Often, keva is disparaged or ignored, because it feels boring, or repetitive, or that it’s simply rote recitation.

But when prayer is at its best, keva actually helps us get to kavannah. Rabbi Shawn Zevit says it well:

What is the structure that allows you to express your longing, your thanks, your wow, your reflection? I find that prayer, the structure of it and our own particular Jewish nuances of it, is an optimal part of the living diet for well-being In the Jewish modalities of prayer, those very longings, those very human dimensions are addressed… (in Comins, Making Prayer Real, 146-7)

We want to be inspired. We want to find strength. We want to feel connected to something larger than ourselves. But those moments rarely happen by accident.

By giving us a framework, rules and structures can help us get there. They remind us to practice. They tell us what to look for. And they allow us to regularly experience the ordinary, so that we can be ready to experience the extraordinary.

Indeed, that’s the deep connection between both games and religion. In a review of Robert Bellah’s book Religion in Human Evolution, Charles Mathewes reminds us that

…[p]lay involves a dialectic of freedom and constraint, or better, freedom within constraint. This is obviously so in games, but equally so in any form of play. The boundaries of play, the delimiting and the defining of the conditions of play, themselves can stand in a kind of dream-like state of critical assessment…

In short, play nourishes us, makes us fully human, equips us for reflective agency and enables us to understand that behind (or above) the routines of the everyday there can be a carnival of an altogether different sort.

In other words, “playing” and “praying” have much more in common than we may think.

What Believers and Atheists Can Learn From Each Other (co-written with Sam McNerney)

Rabbi Geoffrey Mitelman: It’s inherently challenging for believers and atheists to have productive conversations. Discussing topics such as belief and nonbelief, the potential irrationality of religion, or the limits of scientific knowledge is difficult since each side often ends up more firmly entrenched in their own worldview.

But one bright person interested in broadening the conversation is Sam McNerney, a science writer who focuses on cognitive science and an atheist interested in religion from a psychological point of view.

I found Sam through his writing on ScientificAmerican.com, and started reading his blog Why We Reason and his posts on BigThink.com. We discovered that even though we approached religion from different perspectives, we had great respect for each other.

So as two people with different religious outlooks we wondered: what can we learn from each other?

Sam McNerney: There are many things we can learn. Let’s take one: the role of authority.

A recent New York Times article points out that secular liberal atheists tend to conflate authority, loyalty and sanctity with racism, sexism and homophobia. It’s not difficult to see why. Societies suffer when authority figures, being motivated by sacred values and religious beliefs, forbid their citizens from challenging the status quo. But a respect for authority and the principles they uphold to some degree is necessary if societies seek to maintain order and justice and function properly. The primatologist Frans de Waal explains it this way: “Without agreement on rank and a certain respect for authority there can be no great sensitivity to social rules, as anyone who has tried to teach simple house rules to a cat will agree.” (Haidt, 106)

Ironically, atheists’ steadfast allegiance to rationality, secular thinking and the importance of open-mindedness blinds them to important religious values including respect for authority. As a result, atheists tend to confuse authority with exploitation and evil and undervalue the vital role authority plays in a healthy society.

Geoff: You accurately bring up one aspect of why organized religion can be so complicated: it is intertwined with power. And I’m glad you note that authority and power are not inherently bad when it comes to religion. In fact, as you also say, a certain degree of authority is necessary.

To me, the real problem arises when religion adds another element into the mix: certainty. It’s a toxic combination to have religious authorities with the power to influence others claiming to “know” with 100% certainty that they’re right and everyone else is wrong.

One thing I learned from several atheists is the importance of skepticism and doubt. Indeed, while certainty leads to arrogance, uncertainty leads to humility. We open up the conversation and value diverse experiences when we approach the world with a perspective of “I’m not sure” or “I could be wrong.”

Recently, astrophysicist Adam Frank wrote a beautiful piece on NPR’s blog 13.7 about how valuable uncertainty can be:

Dig around in most of the world’s great religious traditions and you find people finding their sense of grace by embracing uncertainty rather than trying to bury it in codified dogmas…

Though I am an atheist, some of the wisest people I have met are those whose spiritual lives (some explicitly religious, some not) have forced them to continually confront uncertainty. This daily act has made them patient and forgiving, generous and inclusive. Likewise, the atheists I have met who most embody the ideals of free inquiry seem to best understand the limitations of every perspective, including their own. They encounter the ever shifting ground of their lives with humor, good will and compassion.

Certainty can be seductive, but it hurts our ability to engage with others in constructive ways. Thus when religious people talk about God, belief or faith, we have to approach the conversation with a little humility and recognize that we don’t have a monopoly on the truth. In the words of Rabbi Brad Hirschfield, we need to realize that another person doesn’t have to be wrong for us to be right.

This doesn’t mean believers and atheists will agree on the role of religion in society, the validity of a particular belief system, or even the very existence of God. In fact, believers and atheists will almost certainly continue to vehemently disagree about these questions. But we have to remember that not all disagreements are bad. Some arguments are quite beneficial because they help us gain a deeper understanding of reality, encourage clearer thinking, and broaden people’s perspectives.

The Rabbis even draw a distinction between two different kinds of arguments. Arguments they call “for the sake of Heaven” will always be valuable, while arguments that are only for self-aggrandizement will never be productive (Avot 5:20). So I’m not interested in arguments that devolve into mocking, ridicule, name-calling or one-upmanship. But I’d gladly participate in any discussion if we are arguing about how we make ourselves and this world better, and would actively strive to involve whoever wants to be part of that endeavor, regardless of what they may or may not believe.

Sam: You are right to point out that both atheists and believers under the illusion of certainty smother potentially productive dialogue with disrespectful rhetoric. What’s alarming is that atheism in the United States is now more than non-belief. It’s an intense and widely shared sentiment where a belief in God is not only false, but also ridiculous. Pointing out how irrational religion can be is entertaining for too many.

There’s no doubt that religious beliefs influence negative behavioral consequences, so atheists are right to criticize religion on many epistemological claims. But I’ve learned from believers and my background in cognitive psychology that faith-based beliefs are not necessarily irrational.

Consider a clever study recently conducted by Kevin Rounding of Queen’s University in Ontario that demonstrates how religion helps increase self-control. In two experiments participants (many of whom identified as atheists) were primed with a religious mindset – they unscrambled short sentences containing words such as “God,” “divine” and “Bible.” Compared to a control group, they were able to drink more sour juice and were more willing to accept $6 in a week instead of $5 immediately. Similar lines of research show that religious people are less likely to develop unhealthy habits like drinking, taking drugs, smoking and engaging in risky sex.

Studies also suggest that religious and spiritual people, especially those living in the developing world, are happier and live longer, on average, than non-believers. Religious people also tend to feel more connected to something beyond themselves; a sentiment that contributes to well-being significantly.

It’s unclear if these findings are correlative or causal – it’s likely that many of the benefits that come from believing in God arise not from beliefs per se but from strong social ties that religious communities do such a good job of fostering. Whatever the case, this research should make atheists pause before they dismiss all religious beliefs as irrational or ridiculous.

Geoff: It’s interesting — that actually leads to another area where atheists have pushed believers in important ways, namely, to focus less on the beliefs themselves, and more on how those beliefs manifest themselves in actions. And to paraphrase Steven Pinker, the actions that religious people need to focus on are less about “saving souls,” and more about “improving lives.”

For much of human history the goal of religion was to get people to believe a certain ideology or join a certain community. “Being religious” was a value in and of itself, and was often simply a given, but today, we live in a world where people are free to choose what they believe in. So now, the goal of religion should be to help people find more fulfillment in their own lives and to help people make a positive impact on others’ lives.

It’s important to note that people certainly do not need religion to act morally or find fulfillment. But as Jonathan Haidt writes in his new book The Righteous Mind, religion can certainly make it easier.

Haidt argues that our mind is like a rider who sits atop an elephant to suggest that our moral deliberations (the rider) are post-hoc rationalizations of our moral intuitions (the elephant). The key to his metaphor is that intuitions comes first (and are much more powerful) and strategic reason comes afterwards.

We need our rider because it allows us to think critically. But our elephant is also important because it motivates us to connect with others who share a moral vision. Ultimately, if we are striving to build communities and strengthen our morals, we cannot rely exclusively on either the rider or the elephant; we need both. As Haidt explains:

If you live in a religious community, you are enmeshed in a set of norms, institutions and relationships that work primarily on the elephant to influence your behavior. But if you are an atheist living in a looser community with a less binding moral matrix, you might have to rely somewhat more on an internal moral compass, read by the rider. That might sound appealing to rationalists, but it is also a recipe for…a society that no longer has a shared moral order. [And w]e evolved to live, trade and trust within shared moral matrices. (Haidt, 269)

Since religion is a human construct, with its “norms, institutions and relationships,” it can be used in a variety of different ways. It can obviously be used to shut down critical thinking and oppress others. But as you mention, religion has positive effects on well-being, and religious beliefs correlate with a sense of fulfillment. Perhaps the job of religion, then, should be giving us a common language, rituals, and communities that reinforce and strengthen our ability to become better human beings and find joy and meaning in our lives.

Ultimately, we don’t have to agree with someone in order to learn from them. As Ben Zoma, a 2nd century Jewish sage, reminds us: “Who is wise? The person who learns from all people.” (Avot 4:1) When we are willing to open ourselves up to others, we open ourselves up to new ideas and different perspectives.

Indeed, I have come to believe that our purpose as human beings – whether we identify as a believer, an atheist, or anything in between – is to better ourselves and our world. And any source of knowledge that leads us to that goal is worth pursuing.

Is Religion Analytical or Intuitive?

A new study has just come out that argues that analytical thinking weakens religious belief, while at the same time, intuitive thinking may strengthen religious feelings.

Though the article comes out in Science today, this idea has been hypothesized for the last few years. For example, last September neuroscientist Joshua Greene and colleagues at Harvard University

…asked hundreds of volunteers recruited online to answer three questions with appealingly intuitive answers that turn out to be wrong. For example, “A bat and ball cost $1.10 in total. The bat costs $1.00 more than the ball. How much does the ball cost?”

Although $0.10 comes easily to mind (it’s the intuitive answer), it takes some analytical thought to come up with the correct answer of $0.05. People who chose more intuitive answers on these questions were more likely to report stronger religious beliefs, even when the researchers controlled for IQ, education, political leanings, and other factors.

In the same study, another group of volunteers wrote a paragraph about a time in their lives when either following their intuition or careful reasoning led to a good outcome. Those who wrote about intuition reported stronger religious beliefs on a questionnaire taken immediately afterward.

So why might critical thinking lessen religious belief? Why might intuitive thinking strengthen it? And what are the implications for the religious community?

First, from the critical thinking side, it seems obvious as to why analytic thought might lessen religious belief. After all, when you start to think critically, you stop accepting things purely “on faith.” So when people look at their texts or beliefs through a critical lens, they naturally begin to question the religious tenets that they held throughout their lives.

And yet religion is not just intellectual — it is designed to be predominantly emotional and spiritual. It is supposed to make us feel things — it is supposed to generate a sense of awe and wonder, build connections to others, elevate our compassion for those in need, and make us work to right the wrongs in this world.

So what does this mean for religion today? It means that for our world today, religion has to strive to be both intellectually sophisticated and emotionally resonant.

If religion is simplistic, or dogmatic, or anti-scientific, then as soon as new information or new ideas arise, it will shut itself off from the outside world. And as soon as it closes the door on new ideas, religion will stop being relevant.

And if religion is stale, or boring, or uninspiring, then no one will want to be part of it.

But if religion speaks to our deepest longings, if it inspires us to become better people, and if it can embrace not only faith but doubt, as well, then it will have the potential to become a great force for good in this world.

As Mayor Cory Booker said in a post on The Christian Left:

“Before you speak to me about your religion, first show it to me in how you treat other people; before you tell me how much you love your God, show me in how much you love all His children; before you preach to me of your passion for your faith, teach me about it through your compassion for your neighbors. In the end, I’m not as interested in what you have to tell or sell as in how you choose to live and give.”

Yes, critical thinking may lessen religious belief, and yes, intuitive thinking may strengthen it. But we have to remember that “religious belief” is not a value in and of itself.

Instead, the real question is how we use our religious beliefs to improve ourselves and our world.

Why Bernie Madoff Didn’t Lurk in Dark Alleys

We all know that one of the Ten Commandments is “Don’t steal.” But it’s also hard for us to imagine Bernie Madoff or Jeffrey Skilling in a hooded sweatshirt in a darkened alley mugging a little old lady. And yet clearly, Madoff and Skilling violated that two-word, easy-to-understand commandment. So we have to ask: how in the world were they able to justify it?

A large part of that justification is because different forms of stealing have different “feels” to them. Physically taking money from another person feels more violent, more immediate, and less justifiable of an action. “Cooking the books,” however, can easily feel explainable by the perpetrator. It’s pretty easy to follow the commandment “Don’t steal” if it simply means, “Don’t go around robbing people in the middle of the night.” But Skilling and Madoff did steal – and stole significantly more money than all the armed robbers in America combined.

In fact, when people don’t deal in cash directly, they actually are able to rationalize their actions, and thus end up stealing significantly more money from people.

Cash Keeps Us (More) Honest

Behavioral economist Dan Ariely ran a fascinating study in the MIT dorm rooms to examine what might allow people to steal without feeling all that guilty about it. At first, he put six Coke cans in a communal refrigerator. Within three days, all six cans were gone. No doubt, people thought, “No one will notice, and hey – free Coke!”

He then put six one-dollar bills on a plate in the refrigerator. They were left totally untouched.

Why? As Ariely explains:

When we look at the world around us, much of the dishonesty we see involves cheating that is one step removed from cash. Companies cheat with their accounting practices; executives cheat by using backdated stock options; lobbyists cheat by underwriting parties for politicians; drug companies cheat by sending doctors and their wives off on posh vacations. To be sure, these people don’t cheat with cold, hard cash (except occasionally). And that’s my point: cheating is a lot easier when it’s a step removed from money. (Ariely, Predictably Irrational, 218-219)

There seems to be a psychological block that prevents most of us from simply forcibly taking cash from people, but allows us to rationalize small falsifications that ultimately end up being the same thing as stealing. And that is why, in fact, the Torah has more to say about honesty in business beyond just, “Don’t steal.” In Leviticus, the Torah even regulates what might happen one step away from money that might lead people to cheat.

Honest Weights and Measures

Leviticus 19 contains some of the most important and most famous laws in the Torah. The Ten Commandments appear here, as do the verses, “You shall not stand by idly while your neighbor bleeds” and “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” The whole chapter is known as the “holiness code,” implying that beyond just being ethical, treating people fairly is truly a sacred obligation that God demands of us.

The very last laws in chapter 19 say, “You shall not falsify measures of length, weight or capacity. You shall have an honest balance, honest weights, an honest ephah (a unit of dry measure) and an honest hin (a unit of liquid measure)…” (Leviticus 19:35-36)

Why did this law have to be written in the first place? The simple answer is: you don’t forbid something from happening unless it has already been occurring. So clearly, there were people who would falsify their weights and measures. Cheating and stealing are nothing new in today’s society!

And that’s what makes this commandment so important and valuable. If the Torah had simply said, “Don’t steal,” our natural ability to rationalize would have given people the opportunity to say, “Well, if I weigh down my grain a little bit, no one will really notice. And after all, everyone else is doing it, so it’s not really stealing.” Instead, the Torah teaches us, “Don’t cheat even – perhaps especially – when you’re one step removed from money.” It’s a lot easier to steal when you’re one step removed – and that’s why that commandment is needed.

The First Thing We Will Be Asked When We Die

The Rabbis even elevated honesty in business to become one of the highest values we need to live up to. In fact, in the Rabbinic mind, the first thing God will ask us when we die is not, “Did you believe in Me?” or “Did you pray?” No – according to the Talmud (Shabbat 31a), the first question we will be asked when we die is, “Were you honest in your business dealings?”

We sometimes say that we know we are acting honestly if we can look at ourselves in the mirror in the morning. But perhaps that is not enough of a judge. After all, our ability to rationalize could make it very easy for us to say, “Well, it’s just a small thing I’m taking.” Moment by moment, we can easily find ways to steal that feel OK and won’t cause us to lose sleep.

So to truly bring ourselves up to our highest standards, the question should not be, “How do we feel about ourselves right now?” It should really be, “How do we want to feel about ourselves at the end of our lives?”

Only by having our day-to-day actions live up to the values we espouse can we truly be proud of the actions we take.