Rosh Hashanah President’s message

As we gather on Rosh Hashanah, we naturally look forward. We think about the year ahead, the choices we will make, the people we love, and the kind of world we hope to help create. I want to begin by looking back.

Twenty-five years ago this week, our country experienced September 11th. Those of us who lived through those days remember the disbelief. The images. The fear. The unanswered questions. We were trying to understand something that seemed impossible to understand. And here in North Lake Tahoe, our Jewish community did something very simple.

We came together.

We didn’t have a building then. We didn’t need one to be a community. We gathered at the beach in Kings Beach. We stood together beside Lake Tahoe, surrounded by these mountains that have always seemed so permanent, while everything else in the world suddenly felt terribly uncertain. We grieved together. We talked. We laughed a little, because sometimes that’s what we Jews do when things are unbearable. We cried. We held one another. And together, we tried to piece together what had happened and what it meant.

I have thought about that gathering many times because that day taught us something important: a congregation is not a building. A congregation is people who show up. We show up for one another in times of tragedy. We show up for births and B’nai Mitzvah. We show up for weddings and funerals. We show up at Shabbat dinners and holiday celebrations. We show up when someone needs comfort, and we show up when there is something wonderful to celebrate. Sometimes we even show up when we aren’t quite sure why we came—and discover that being together was exactly what we needed.

Today, we are fortunate to have a home for our Jewish community. But the reason for this congregation remains exactly the same as it was on that beach twenty-five years ago. We need one another. Perhaps today we need community more than ever. We live in a time when it is very easy to become isolated from one another. We can watch services on a screen. We can send a text instead of having a conversation. We can read the news alone and worry alone. But Judaism has never been intended to be practiced alone. Judaism calls us into community. And maintaining that community takes more than good intentions.

It takes all of us.

North Tahoe Hebrew Congregation has made an important commitment: we want Jewish life in Tahoe to be welcoming and accessible. We want people to walk through our doors regardless of their ability to pay. We want families, visitors, children, seniors, longtime members, and people who are simply curious about Judaism to know there is a place for them here.

But there is a financial reality behind that promise. Our building must be maintained. Our clergy and staff must be supported. Our programs must be funded. And increasingly, we must invest significant resources simply to make sure that when we gather, we can do so safely.

That is why I am asking you, as we begin this new year, to think about what this community means to you—and what you want it to mean twenty-five years from now. You may one day need this congregation in a way they cannot yet imagine. A child who celebrates Rosh Hashanah with us today may someday bring their own children here. And someday, when the world once again feels uncertain, another generation of Jews in Tahoe will need a place to gather—to grieve, to laugh, to cry, to pray, and simply to be together.

We are responsible for making sure that place is still here.

I ask you to support this congregation as generously as you are able. Not simply to pay our bills. But to sustain a community. To preserve Jewish life in these mountains. To make sure there will always be a place where someone can say, “I need my Jewish community,” and discover that their Jewish community is already there, waiting for them.

Twenty-five years ago, we didn’t have a building. We had each other. Today, we are blessed to have both. And now it is our responsibility to pass that blessing forward.

There is a beautiful Jewish phrase: l’dor vador—from generation to generation. We often think of l’dor vador as passing down our traditions—our Torah, our prayers, our holidays, our stories. But we must also pass down the community that keeps those traditions alive.

Those who came before us created something here in Tahoe. They gathered when there was no building. They created a Jewish home in a place where creating one was not always easy.

Now it is our turn.

What we give today—our time, our caring, our participation, and yes, our financial support—is not simply for us.

It is our gift to people we may never meet.

It is for the child who will stand on this bimah twenty-five years from now. It is for the family who will walk through these doors looking for a Jewish home. And it is for that future moment when someone needs their community and discovers, just as we did on that beach in Kings Beach, that they do not have to face the world alone.

That is l’dor vador. That is our responsibility. And that is our promise.

May we leave the next generation a Jewish community that is strong, welcoming, relevant, and enduring. And may they do the same for the generation that follows them.

L’dor vador—from generation to generation.

Shanah Tovah U’Metukah.

May this be a sweet year, a year of peace, and above all, a year in which we continue to show up for one another.

Heidi Doyle, President