Sermons of Rebuke: Chukat-Balak

by Rivka Schwartz

The Three Weeks begin this Wednesday night. The rabbi said that nobody has to raise their level of mourning in our shul.
To quote: “It’s depressing enough in this shul. Nobody has ever felt as much sadness as having to Daven with the membership of Beis Knesses Anshei Emes uSefilah. Each day with you, I mourn the destruction of the Beit HaMikdash. It’s always Tisha BAv at our shul.”
 
This week we celebrate wellness in our shul with Wellness Shabbat, as none of you are well. We’re going to be focusing on Bernie and the women with huge hats, who’ve been frowning since 1986.
 
Chesed Opportunities: Talking to Bernie and the Smug Frowning Hat Women. Keeping their attention is a great act of kindness to the rest of the congregants that can’t deal with them.
 
Contemporary Halacha Classes: The Art of Bringing Down Everybody Else in Shul with Our Congregants. The Art of Sadness and Having to Deal with Our Congregants. Wellness and How to Keep Healthy by Staying Away from Our Membership. Mental Health and How You Stole it From Me. How Hard Chesed Is When You're in a Community Like Ours- A Mental Health Session.

Rivka’s Community Rundown
“It’s always Tisha BAv at our shul.” No truer words have ever been spoken. You see the members of our shul and you want to move to Jerusalem. Or anywhere else.
It’s always Tisha BAv. If you ever had the egg salad at Kiddish, you would understand. It's disgusting. Our egg salad should be marketed as the Seudah Mafseket. The meal of sadness before Tisha BAv. Our egg salad and sitting with one of our members will get anybody into the Tisha BAv mood.
I don't think I've seen a smile since last Tisha BAv. Tisha BAv is a pick-me-up in our congregation. 
The rabbi went on in his sermon, "The Three Weeks between the sadness is a time of hardship and struggle. Every day at our shul is a struggle. Every time I sit with the board, it's hardship. You, my congregants, are hardship and struggle. You are the Diaspora. If there is one positive thing in Moshe's life, it's that you were not his congregants... But you were there. We were all there at Sinai. And you are the reason for Tisha BAv." I was so touched. Nobody could've put down Sarah Bracha like the rabbi did. Our congregation is the reason. I told the rabbi how much I appreciated him expressing my feelings.
 
What is Wellness Shabbat? Is that a commandment? I truthfully had no idea we had to be well. If being well was a Mitzvah, our congregation is full of a bunch of sinners.
Over Wellness Shabbat we spoke of mental illness, and they brought in examples from our congregation. Which meant the rabbi had a chance to go off on every single congregant's quirks. This included Chaim breathing through his nose. Which somehow bothers the rabbi. Cheryl using her finger to follow along in the Siddur also very much angers the rabbi. Lin not showing up to shul, the rabbi likes that.

It's the hats. That's it. That's why everybody frowns all the time. It's the hats and the Tisha BAv mood they all love. There's something about huge hats that has these women walking around all smug. The need to balance the Jewish fascinator brim hats, along with the weight, causes that look.

Bernie is annoying. I think that was the discussion of Wellness Shabbat. How do we deal with him? Him, Bernie, being our problem. That's where the rabbi was steering the conversation. Bernie and big hats.

The Jewish Family Services therapists should've focused their discussion of mental health on how to stay away from our membership. It doesn't take more than five minutes to come up with that diagnosis.
The therapists walked away from the group sessions not feeling well. In response to the Wellness Shabbat, the therapists suggested that for our mental health we all go to another shul.

Everybody in our religion has problems. That's what I garnered from the rabbi's message. And we all have OCD. That's what the Gabai who can't get a name right said of Jews. You call them up for an Aliyah, get their dad's name right. And then the therapists piggybacked on the OCD thing. They saw business opportunity in religious Jews being Midakdek. Being precise about what you do is a disease nowadays.
OCD is a good thing. That's what I say. It keeps people religious. Keeping Mitzvahs takes OCD. "I have to wake up on time for Shacharit." "I can't tie my right shoelace first. I'm not going to Gehenim." "We have to vacation in Florida this winter." And it keeps people from eating at my house. "I can't eat at Rivka's. She's not Frum enough."
They were selling that OCD therapy. They went with it. The therapists ended up giving out cards, telling each one of us, "Here. Take a card. You're religious. You have OCD. You need help."
The rabbi then somehow said that we shouldn't make ourselves sick from worrying about Mitzvahs for months on end. Now our congregants feel it's proper Biblical practice to not keep Pesach.
So, I guess the ending message of the OCD Wellness Shabbat was that we shouldn't be religious. And we shouldn't mourn for the Temple. Something is definitely off in my shul.

​The Jewish Family Services therapist speaker had a message about what she called a safe container community. We all need a community of people we can trust. People we feel comfortable around. People who care about us. She's an idiot. Apparently, she has no idea what a community is.
 
Did I leave out anything from my writing? OCD! You see. I have an issue. I edit sometimes.
If there are any grammatical mistakes, it's only because I'm healthy.