According to an ancient Jewish teaching, our world stands on a tripod of learning, worship / work, and caring actions. Yet caring actions are the only "leg" that can truly support us over the long term.

This is demonstrated by a related teaching about a man who asked the sage Hillel to teach him the entire Torah while standing on one foot. Hillel's response was decisive: "What is hateful to you, do not do to your counterpart. That is the entire Torah. The rest is commentary — go and learn!"

The 20th anniversary of the September 11th attacks reminds us of how caring actions can move just as decisively to the forefront of our concern. For days and weeks and months afterward, we reached out and supported each other "on one foot" of the global tripod. LEARN MORE

But the trauma of that time also increased hatred and violence within the U.S. as well as beyond our borders. Now we need to bear witness more deeply, to learn from our mistakes so that we can take steps toward real healing and justice.

Wally Gobetz - Battery Labyrinth (2007) 

Walker, your footprints are the path, and nothing else. / Walker, there is no path: we make the path by walking. — Antonio Machado

A labyrinth is one of the oldest contemplative tools in human history, a winding circular path that provides a continuous route to the center and then returns to where the walker began. It offers balance and perspective, reminding us that how we take each step — and navigate each turning point — is how we respond to life.

Today WAYS OF PEACE led an interfaith peace walk at the 9/11 Commemorative Labyrinth south of Ground Zero — moving through the 20th anniversary of tragedies that shook our communities, our cities, and our world. We shared our memories, our pain, our unanswered questions, our shared quest for healing. Walking the path together, we supported each other in bearing witness to shattering and brokenness. One step at a time, we recommitted ourselves to the still, small voices of peace and healing.

* This 20th anniversary peace walk was offered through How to Mourn AND Organize, an integrative project of WAYS OF PEACE. We are continuing these interfaith peace walks at the 9/11 Commemorative Labyrinth every 4-6 weeks. Please contact us for information about how to participate.

Outside the entrance to the Sunset Park disaster morgue, Brooklyn, NY. Photo credit: KIKI VALENTINE

“A Year of Vigil for the Pandemic Dead and Beyond” (Tricycle Magazine)

The one-year anniversary of our vigil has now come and gone. Our nation stumbles forward, grasping for daily life as we previously thought we knew it. The Medical Examiner’s office is proceeding with arrangements for transfer of more bodies to Hart Island, NYC’s municipal burial ground off the coast of the Bronx.

 

Yet the "Great Matter" of life and death has not changed — and will accompany us as we move on. (...) READ MORE

“NYC temporary morgue lingers, a reminder of pandemic’s pain” (Associated Press)

Rabbi Regina Sandler-Phillips — who has organized volunteers to keep at-home vigils for the dead around the world, especially the unclaimed and unnamed — ventures periodically to an unobtrusive spot near the temporary morgue. She goes to bear witness “to what is not seen, and those who are not named,” she says.

 

The pain surrounding the facility’s creation and continued use “highlights the difficulties of how we honor the dead,” she says. (...) READ MORE

“Keeping vigil for the bodies stored at Sunset Park” (Spectrum News NY1)

When she’s not holding vigil in person at the NYC disaster morgue, Rabbi Regina Sandler-Phillips honors the dead remotely at midnight. She’s been doing that every night since the beginning of the pandemic, not just for the bodies stored in the trucks along the Brooklyn waterfront, but for victims of coronavirus around the world....

 

This eventually blossomed into Share the Vigil, a network of 12 to 18 volunteers across the country who commit at least one hour a week to honor the deceased. The only requirement is time — vigil keepers may utilize that hour as they see fit. (...) READ MORE

Share the Vigil is a How to Mourn AND Organize initiative of WAYS OF PEACE.

Wednesday, January 13th, 2021 at 8 PM EST on Zoom*
Honoring the 20th Yahrtzeit of Irving Samuel Phillips z"l

"I would be remiss in thinking back through my mothers, if I did not also acknowledge and honor my fathers — Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and IRVING — Irving being my own father, Irving Samuel Phillips, my most immediate link to the chain of patriarchs."

Four of the biblical Twelve Tribes of Israel were descendents of servant-class wives. Our ambivalence about naming these mothers as ancestors is deep and longstanding.

This "caste study" will weave together ancient source texts (translations provided) with perspectives of Rabbi Yisrael Salanter, James Baldwin, Isabel Wilkerson, and Sweet Honey in the Rock. Come and explore a more inclusive understanding of ancestral legacies, and practice a deeper listening to silences that we often take for granted — especially during these turbulent times.

All are welcome regardless of religious background or text study experience. Maybe you'll even sing along!

*Sponsored by Altshul Wednesdays. Please write to waysofpeace.org@gmail.com

no later than 5 PM on Wednesday 1/13 for Zoom access