I like being Jewish for holidays like Rosh Hashanah. It makes sense to put the past behind me as I start the new year. Before the holiday, one asks for forgiveness from people and during the holiday from God. It was not an easy year to talk to God without acrimony and the Chabbad Rabbi in the synagogue I attended knew it, felt it. So, he told us a personal story I thought worth sharing:

When his brother was a young child, his father took him to visit the Lubavitcher Rebbe. The Rebbe asked the child if he know the Shma (Here O 'Israel the Lord our God, the Lord is One). The kid said yes and after some hesitation he recited it. The Rebbe told the father to teach the kid to recite it with his hand covering the eyes (the way women recite the blessing for the Sabbath Candles). The father told this story in a prayer service held after thirty days of someone's death, in this case, the child's. Sometime, the only way one is able to go on praying is with eyes closed to reality.

This past year was filled with such unbearable times. So, along with others, I covered my eyes and prayed for the strength to go on with eyes wide open. For there is no other way to fight the natural and man made evils which are confronting us.