It's Yom Kippur, and on my laptop I have two windows open. On one, I am streaming the final service of the day, Nei'lah from Lab/Shul, a project of Storahtelling's Amichai Lau Lavie. It's passionate, musical, innovative, and moving.
In the other window is live video from 9News.com from the Boulder Airport, where National Guard helicopters are taking off and landing in a constant stream. They are looking for and looking after victims of the devastating Colorado floods.
When the bay doors of one of the helicopters opened, it revealed a large cardboard sign with this handwritten message:
ARE
YOU
OK?
I can picture the helicopters hovering above the floodwaters, a Guardsman or woman spotting a person and holing up the sign, then waiting for a sign.
Yes, we're fine.
No, we're not fine. We need help!
At its best, Yom Kippur asks the same question.
My daughter loves to tell the story of the man who was caught in a shipwreck. A rescuer in a small row boat came and offered assistance. The man refused, saying confidently, "No thanks. God will save me." The woman in the row boat shook her head in dismay and went on her way. Then a larger ship happened by, and the captain shouted down to the man, who was clinging to what was left of his own ship. Again, he refused help. "No thanks! God will save me!" Finally, a rescue helicopter comes by and tries once again to offer the man help. Maybe they even held up a sign. Again, he refuses. "No thanks! God will save me!"
The man dies, and when he gets to heaven, he meets God. "God. What the heck? Why didn't you save me?"
God says, "What else did you want me to do? I sent a boat, a ship and a helicopter! You fool."
At Nei'lah, we come face to face with the big questions.
ARE
YOU
OK?
We are tired. We are hungry. We stand for the entire service, the ark open the Torahs revealed and standing witness to our final pleas. Dressed in white, a reminder of the burial shrouds we will all eventually wear, we confess our wrongdoings for a final time and try to squeeze in some last minutes of soul searching before the gates of heaven close to us.
We stand up, say what we need to, and voice our needs. Not in shouts, but in whispers.
Our religion is a smart one. We have specific rituals to deal with grief; we build sukkahs to house our joy; we have prayers and traditions and rituals for every stage of life and, seemingly, every human emotion. We have Yom Kippur, which is a time set aside for asking the big questions. What have I done in the past year that I regret? How have I fallen short? The picture we paint of ourselves is not always a fun one to look at. But in the end, when the light of Yom Kippur fades, we are really left with one question:
AM
I
OK?
We all have to be careful not to ignore the row boats, ships and helicopters in our lives. Today, when the total number of people unaccounted for in this terrible flood stands at over 200, we must also remember that sometimes there is nothing that can be done against the forces in our lives -- the forces of nature, the forces of the needs of the others; the forces of all those things that are bigger than ourselves. This is part of Yom Kippur, too.
Sometimes you are not OK.
Tonight I will turn some of my prayers to those who are not OK.
Families who have lost everything to the water.
Families who are still stranded on the mountain, waiting for their rescue.
Those who are missing, and those who are looking for them.
Children in Syria who have lost their parents, grandparents and siblings to war.
Parents in Syria who have lost their children.
Those around the world who are truly hungry.
To all who carry their own pain.
The gates of Nei'lah are closing.
But so many gates are opening.
And as your friend, I ask you sincerely...
ARE
YOU
OK?
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