Pre-shabbat action

Make climate action a regular habit, and connect that action to your Jewish values and practices.

Pre-shabbat action of the week

Shabbat Shalom! Is anyone else feeling scattered these days?  Between election news, the government shutdown, supercharged hurricanes, and our busy lives, no wonder our heads are spinning.  Let’s take a moment to center ourselves in action before centering ourselves in the rest and reflection of Shabbat.

We have a new opportunity to resist the proposed Williams NESE pipeline!  Our allies at New Yorkers for Clean Power and the Natural Resources Defense Council are challenging the NY Public Service Commission’s decision earlier this fall to approve National Grid’s plan, including the Williams and other proposed fossil fuel pipelines.  Click here to send a letter in support of these petitions now - we can’t afford to be sinking more money into infrastructure that pollutes our air, threatens delicate ecosystems, and takes us farther away from a sustainable future!

Reminder: if you haven’t yet signed our Jewish community letter to Governor Hochul urging her to advance renewables in NYS, please do so here and share it with your networks!

Idea to Ponder:

Obligation. Calling. These are big words. They can be daunting. As we push forward doggedly in our climate work, how do we see ourselves and from where do we draw strength?

Torah tells us that Noah took on the major obligation of building an ark and populating it with life. But God literally closed the door of the Ark before bringing the flood. Noah gets that wind at his back.

Abraham (at that point still Abram), who we read about in this week’s parsha, heard a calling and entered into a covenant that became an obligation. God’s promise that he will become a great nation gave Abram a wind at his back. 

And us? We are the ones alive today in this time of crisis and peril. We could see it as a burden we neither sought nor wanted. But here we are, making the phone calls, showing up at the rallies, organizing others to take action. Where’s the wind at our backs? 

One answer might be both comforting and generative: purpose. We can easily feel deployed by the Holy One to protect creation. What bigger purpose could there be? Purpose makes room for joy and patience. It can temper the inevitable frustrations inherent in our work. Sinking down into our sense of purpose creates not just a wind at our backs, but wings to carry us.