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Note from our Rabbi: Feel the Pain, Sing the Songs
Summer 2026
from the Congregation Newsletter

In Pirkei Avot 1:6, Yehudah ben Perakhia is quoted as advising: “find a teacher, acquire a friend, and judge each person on the side of merit [i.e. give people the benefit of the doubt].” As I take stock of both what we have done at TBI since Rosh Hashanah, and what our vision is as we prepare for a new year, I find Rav Yehuda’s statement to be a useful framing.

In this past year at TBI, we’ve been working to help our members acquire friends: in the TBI choir, at Wednesday Soup & Shmooze, at Trans and allies Havdalah, at monthly interfaith potlucks, and at so many wonderful programs put on by our committees as well as the Sisterhood and Brotherhood.

In my efforts to reach across divides and build coalitions with interfaith leaders and community, there has been a great deal of judging with generosity, assuming good intent, and responding to misconceptions with grace. I have had to extend this, and I have been blessed to have this generosity extended to me, as well. This work will be ongoing. In this next year, we are also planning to expand this effort consciously within TBI. This past year heightened questions that have always existed about how big the TBI tent is, who feels like they belong, and who wonders whether they are at the margins. These questions are especially heightened around orientations to Israel/Palestine. Members with vastly different positions and commitments all have one thing in common: they are not sure if they belong here. My goal as we prepare this next program year is to make TBI a space where people can be honest about their identities and positions. I hope we can learn and challenge and be challenged by each other—in short, where we can “judge each person on the side of merit,” with a curiosity and openness that comes when we feel psychologically safe.​

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​Finally, we are blessed that we will be acquiring a new teacher at TBI! Over the past year my coalition-building outside of the TBI community has taken my energies away from teaching within the community. Thanks to some generous donors, a new Adult Education Specialist, Kim Rosenthal, will be coming to fill that gap. If you’ve encountered Kim from her two years recently as Senior Jewish Educator at Oregon Hillel, you know what an incredible spirit she is. She’ll be joining us part-time for a pilot year, and considerably fleshing out our adult education programming, launching an adult b’nei mitzvah cohort and leading some Torah study over the summer.

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So as programming lightens over the summer, I encourage you to consider— how would you like to “find a teacher, acquire a friend and/or judge each person on the side of merit” at TBI in the coming year?

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