A visit to ALYN Hospital inspired Rabbi David Kalender, Congregation Olam Tikvah, Fairfax, VA to deliver a Kol Nidre sermon to his congregation connecting “…..this amazing hospital, ALYN which functions as a powerful metaphor for what Yom Kippur is all about.”
Kol Nidre 5770 – ALYN
Rabbi David Kalender - Congregation Olam Tikvah, Fairfax, VA
The process of how rabbis decide on Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur topics is a mysterious one. There are those who keep a file throughout the year of topics that interest them. As Elul arrives, they open the drawer begin writing. There are others who wait to see what the burning topic of the moment will be, and there certainly are several this year. Sometimes, it’s the lightening bolt method. It’s like the song that Sergeant Sarah Brown and Sky Masterson sing to each, Mine will come as a surprise to me. Mine, I’ll leave to chance and chemistry. Suddenly I’ll know.
And that’s what happened on July 16, 2009, at 10:30am. I turned to my friend and said, “Rachel, a Yamim Noraim sermon just happened.”
She gave me a strange look but though Rachel’s been in Israel for more than 25 years, she grew up in London so she responded very politely, “ok.”
As you know, Olam Tikvah sponsors trips to Israel almost every summer and this past summer’s trip was designed for people who have been recently. This wasn’t the intro class – this was the graduate course that gave people an opportunity to view Israel through a different set of spectacles. I promised they would visit places new to them and one such spot was ALYN Hospital.
I’m certainly familiar with the hospital. Our family, as well as many of you, have generously supported its work, and Olam Tikvah’s name is recognized there. But through our friend, our group enjoyed a special tour that visited just about every corner of the hospital.
The hospital’s official statement reads:
ALYN Pediatric and Adolescent Rehabilitation Center is a facility that rehabilitates infants, children and adolescents who are afflicted with a broad range of physical disabilities. These children have been injured in road accidents and terror attacks, children suffering from congenital conditions and children suffering from physical limitations due to various illnesses.
That sounds impressive, but like any mission statement, it is so general that it doesn’t really explain much.
So what makes it so special?
Obviously, my work brings me into a lot of hospitals. But I have never seen one with so many people WITHOUT identification cards. There’s plenty of staff, but the hallways are filled with people who are not on the staff. It is part of the philosophy that family must be part of the treatment. It doesn’t have to be a parent. It can be an aunt or uncle, grandparent, sibling or cousin, but there has to be a connection to your life outside the hospital. Without that, it is simply time in a hospital. The point is not to help you succeed in the hospital; it’s to rehabilitate you for life.
The 1st day in the hospital is exhausting. A representative from every department of the hospital will come to speak with the patient and the family. There will be a personal meeting with someone from nursing, Psychosocial, Physiotherapy, Speech Therapy and Occupational Therapy. There is a deep understanding that not only does each of them have a place in the patient’s rehab, but each department must know what the other departments are doing. It makes it clear for not only the patient, but for the family that rehabilitation, like life, works on several levels. You can’t simply approach it from one direction. It has to be a coordinated approach. It’s not one size fits all.
There is no official course of treatment for each patient. Each child’s care is totally personalized. The team meets constantly to determine what is working and to adjust the overall picture to make sure that the child’s experience is evaluated in a holistic manner and that the sum is in balance.
No matter how miserable a patient may feel on any particular day, he or she is not permitted to stay in their room. It is very serious tough love. Everyone has to engage. It may not be fun, it may not be easy, it may not even seem directly productive, but EVERYONE must regularly engage with others.
Some things take a long time. The staff of ALYN focuses on the little steps. With the child, with the family, they try and make everyday better than yesterday. They’ve come to recognize that reminding people too often of the ideal end is counter-productive in that they can get discouraged. Do something today you couldn’t do yesterday.
I’m sure most of us in this room have seen a James Bond movie. My favorite part is when Bond goes downstairs to spend a little time with Q. I love the way he puts together the fancy gadgets - The watch that doubles as a laser - the pen that allows him to breathe under water.
It isn’t just the cool gadgets; it’s the way he puts the gadgets together, creating something new and helpful out of seemingly unconnected items. Q helps Bond through his enormous creativity.
ALYN has a basement like that too. Rather than be satisfied with a one-size-fits-all wheelchair, they simply take one apart and put it back together to match the needs of child with a deformed body. The chair has to fit the child, not the child into the chair. Companies sell high chairs, but what if the grandmother responsible for the feeding can’t work the tray mechanism, they take it down to the lab and make it work so the FAMILY can succeed. Figure out some way to get a wheelchair, cousin and a respirator to the zoo instead of watching tv in a hospital room.
Hard work is obligatory. No matter how badly you want to, you’re not allowed to stay in bed. You MUST get up, you must try, you must be around people, you may not be in the mood, but you have to get up anyway.
Smiles are required. One of the core methods used at ALYN is humor therapy. There is a full-time clown on staff who spends time with every child.
Multiple entry points. The textbook says, ‘when a patient presents with x, y should be done. The ALYN way is to throw out ‘that book.’ The caregivers enter the rooms with a toolbox that includes physiotherapy, occupational therapy, hydrotherapy, speech and language therapy, computer technology therapy, animal assisted therapy, humor therapy and garden therapy.
Everything can be a way in. Diversity isn’t just tolerated, it’s celebrated.
When you walk through the hallways, you’ll see people in kippot, you’ll see people in tight belly shirts, you’ll see mothers completely covered in traditional Arab dress, others with sheitels. You will hear Russian, Arabic, French, Hebrew and English. Everyone is coming from a different place. They have nothing in common – rich, poor, Jewish, Christian, Muslim. The only thing they share is that they want to somehow figure out a way to improve things, to correct deficiencies, to make things better by looking at life in a different way.
Aiming for self-sufficiency. At the hospital, as well as the most current newsletter, there’s a picture of a little boy.
He was severely injured in a pedestrian accident; the doctors could not save his legs so both were amputated, one above the knee and one below the knee. After being stabilized in a general hospital he came to ALYN for rehabilitation and after a few weeks of intensive therapies - working to strengthen his arms and the upper part of his body - he was fitted with 2 artificial legs which, during the next few months, he learned to walk on, first with the help of a walker, then with crutches and finally he could walk totally independently - and even run! Finally, in the last picture, he is standing behind a wheelchair, pushing another little boy.
Inspiring, yes! But why today???
Look at your shul, our ‘KK’ Olam Tikvah. The varieties of opportunities are incredible.
Some need the social aspects, some need the intellectual parts, some need the singing, some need the pursuit of justice, some driven by the need to help others, some like the lunch that is part of our Shabbat celebration, some want to see friends, some want to make new ones. Olam Tikvah is a place of cross-pollination. We come for one reason, and then find ourselves drawing strength from others who show us another sacred path.
Our tradition forces us to engage in community. There are 2 responses to this.
1. Judaism doesn’t accept the idea that solitude is the ideal. Sitting in your room learning, with books, with the web, is a wonderful experience, but it cannot be an end. You must get out there to learn from others and share with others. Let the passion of others pull you along. You’ll discover things you didn’t even know were there until you bask in someone else’s interest. The ultimate Jewish study model is the Chevruta – 2 people pushing and pulling each other forward.
2. Secondly, and perhaps more importantly, Judaism isn’t so patient. It isn’t going to let you do everything on your own time. When the sun went down this evening, Yom Kippur began. You may want to delay Shabbat, or a yahrtzheit to a more convenient time, but you can’t. We need to move forward into the next period. Perhaps shiva is the most profound place to see that. Judaism takes us from stage to stage. During those 7 days, even after, we often want to curl up in a corner, alone. Sometimes it moves too slowly, sometimes too quickly, but either way it insists that we move forward.
Rabbi Tarfon taught: Lo Alecha Hamlacha Ligmor, V’lo Atah Ben Horein L’hibateyl Mimena. You may not be able to fully complete the task, but that doesn’t give you permission to ignore it. (Pirkei Avot 2:21).
It seems like the people in the next aisle have got it together. They have a kosher kitchen, or a regular seat on Shabbat morning, they read Hebrew beautifully, my colleague in LA quotes by heart a commentator whose book sits on my shelf with an unbroken binding. It’s easy to reject, or more often, put aside something large and overwhelming. Judaism asks us to just take baby steps towards growth.
Your family Shabbat dinner doesn’t require homemade challah – it requires gathering around the table with people who matter. Learning to read Hebrew isn’t so overwhelming; it just means spending all day on Oct. 25 with me. Studying mishna or Talmud just means coming to a class that Rabbi Shalva or I teach. It’s just one little step – we’ll see where it goes.
Let’s be creative. Subscribe to the free JTS weekly Torah commentary podcast that can go with you on your walk or to the gym? How about a Jewish book on tape for your commute? What about identifying a prayer in the machzor tomorrow that challenges you, then ignore the page numbers we call out and spend 10 minutes writing a better one in your head?
None of us have the perfect situation, none of us have figured out the perfect way to do everything.
I was attracted to two types of therapy – hydrotherapy and garden therapy.
The idea of going to someone whose arms were torn away in a car accident and helping her make something else flower and reach to the sky. What a brilliant concept. It was just a seed in the dirt – what could come from that? But nurturing it, patience and persistence brought about unimaginable beauty. Helping something else reach to the sky!
And the hydrotherapy! I’m certainly not qualified to evaluate the physical therapeutic benefits. Instead, I find myself considering the gift of bringing someone who can barely move into a place where the weight just disappears. We all need to find these ways to get away from the pressure we feel and let ourselves float freely.
It’s so easy, even logical, to say, “I’ll do it tomorrow.” I’ve shared with you before that Sukkot comes much too quickly after Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur. We need time to chill, to relax. On the other hand, having Sukkot begin at the end of this week is the ALYN way. It forces us to put our money where our mouths are. Listen to the words we’re proclaiming this Shabbat Shabbaton, “God, I’ll be better connected to you. Community, I’m going to be more involved. I’m going to reconnect with friends from whom I’ve grown distant.” Our tradition puts that right in front of us and says, Do it now!” Not later when you’re rested and MIGHT be in the mood. Now! – This week!
I love when church groups come to our service. 1st of all, they don’t know what to do with the fact that we aren’t all here 10 minutes before the published start time, sitting quietly in our seats, waiting for the organ music to begin. Secondly, they can’t figure out why we’re all talking to each other instead of sitting quietly with our hands folded into our laps. Finally, they tend to be amazed by the laughter in the room.
But not just in shul. Many of us grew up with an attitude that children should not be present at funerals or shiva homes. With all due respect to our parents, they were wrong. Shiva is not just about the pain of a loss – it’s about the smiles, the blessings of life. Judaism reminds us, our souls demand from us, that we laugh. Like the clown at the hospital, laughter is great medicine. Not just a band-aid, but rather a force that holds within it the power to heal that which is broken. Our tradition wants us to smile, then find the times to be serious, not the other way around.
I appreciate the honor of the invitation, but I’m going to politely turn down the opportunity to come hang a mezuzah on your door. It’s your mezuah and it’s your door. I want to help you discover the kedusha of doing it yourself. It’s the same reason why I almost never officiate at stone dedications (unveilings). Obviously there are exceptions, but Maimonides taught us that the greatest thing we could give someone is the power to be in control of their own life. Help others discover their own sacred connections.
And there’s an extra element to all of this. The place where all of this happens is Israel, Jerusalem in particular. As part of the Jewish people, we take such pride in what is offered by this incredible place.
But too often we get caught in the trap of seeing Israel as the place where Jews and Muslims gather to fight. Or maybe we see it as a museum of Jewish history. The place where our ancestors lived and we now have some contemporary people living in the same place. We see it as the place where Jews can spend their time arguing over Jewish things and not have to confine them to the shul – they can argue at work, in the newspaper and on the streets.
We forget that with all the flaws, the security issues and the mishegas, it is the working laboratory for bringing to life, Jewish ideals. It’s not an abstract, hypothetical possibility we create in our minds’ eyes. It is a living, breathing stumbling, striving home for Judaism. Not all the experiments work, but the sacred power of trying fuels us all. And keep that in mind as you discuss who and what Israel is at the workplace and in your neighborhood. Look at the healing power of that little country, the devotion to helping ALL people, and contrast it with the way energy is expended by too many of the neighboring states.
Finally, this amazing hospital, ALYN, functions as a powerful metaphor for what Yom Kippur is all about.
We are all wounded in one way or another. Each of us is imperfect in so many ways – in desperate need of healing. We cannot see our faults as obstacles to sheleimut – to wholeness. To be honest with ourselves on these days of judgment and potential transformation is to acknowledge our flaws before God, before each other, and in the mirror.
So today, we must respond to the success of ALYN. Judaism encourages us to be creative and broad in our thinking and actions to heal our wounds. We need our family, our friends, and our community - we need dedication and perseverance, we need laughter and we need to be willing to take chances in every way possible. And we need to pull it all together with clarity of purpose.
May this be the year in which we open ourselves to the possibilities of joy and passion that our Jewish tradition offers us. No matter who we are and where we are (physically and spiritually), we can all move forward – if we’re just willing to. There’s always hope and opportunity. We just need to be willing to commit ourselves to making our lives a little more shalom v’shalem - Peaceful and whole.
amen | 
