Friday, August 10, 2007

A Supplement, Not A Substitue

Well, it looks like I will not be able to get to shul tomorrow. Most of the time I am there and it really seems to help me get through the upcoming week. Saturday, however, I need to meet with someone at my home. Most of the time I can avoid a Saturday meeting, but not tomorrow.

I have been to minyan, to services, a few times this week and that does help fill the void, but for me, it is not the same. Why is it that the longest service of the week is the one that also gets the largest crowd? That has been a question that has interested me for quite some time.

Still, I will be preparing for the aliyot I will be laining in a couple of weeks, as well as the Haftorah. Hopefully practicing that, as well as looking over the weekly Torah portion will also help give me my weekly “fix” of shul.

Truth is, in this era of the internet, I can also hop on line and do a Google search (and the search engine of your choice) and find some words of Torah to take the place of a sermon. This will make a difference, but in a real sense, I am glad it does not fill the void. If it did, then this would become just another reason to become more and more removed from being directly involved.

I actually do think that is one of the challenges we have to face today. We need to make sure, with so much out there (at our fingertips) and available to us, we need to make sure people do not step away, or try to remove themselves from being directly involved with the community. This has to be used as a supplement, not a substitute to the way we currently practice out religion.

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