How fortunate we are, to have so many resources available to our community, BY our community! From assistance with getting items, and calls reaching out to each other, to frequent uplifting Enews messages, Zoom Shabbat Services, and more. We have so much to be grateful for!
As we celebrate Pesach, we are each to recall so vividly in our hearts, how we've been helped, brought out of bondage (in our lives) into freedom, that we say, thank G-d! ~with gratefulness and extolling praises!
This evening we'll Zoom our Sefardic Shabbat Dinner (menos comida!). We honor our Sefardic (and Ashkenazi) forbears who made it possible for us to be here, freer than they; who left us a legacy that modeled resilience, courage, and a mental discipline of staying positive and hopeful, borne out of hearts steeped in faith or Emunah. When we act with conscious awareness that we're serving the greater All, this is part of Emunah.
Planted in each of our hearts is unconditional Divine Love & Kindness or Chesed, which especially at Pesach, we are called to magnify, and praise.
On his Zoom shi'ur, Rabbi Miles Krassen referenced three of the Sefirot (energy vortexes) of Kabbalah (a Sefardic mystical tradition from Spain). He explained that we can effect a widespread flowering of "Tiferet" or Beauty, Harmony and Balance. With a great outpouring of our "Chesed", when brought to bear with the current over-abundance of "Gevurah'" (judgement constricting into fear), we can bring into our world transformation and healing through Love. Even in the news, are many more than usual uplifting reports of people acting in loving ways in response to our current health situation~ an example of the mass outpouring of Lovingkindness, transforming fear and suffering.
On the second evening of Pesach we begin counting the Omer for 40 days, representing our people's time in the wilderness, to help us grow after being freed from Mitzrayim (bondage, constrictions). Our beloved Rabbi Min's book, 'Counting the Omer' offers us guiding commentary and practices, using the Kabbalistic model of qualities assigned to the Sefirot, which we can use to also help us grow. (A fellow Kol Zimrah alumni, Susan Windle, also offers her poetic book and online guides).
We each have the power, through our practices in thought and deed, of continually thanking and praising, of magnifying love and joy, in order to align ourselves with the harmonizing, balancing Divine frequency that resides in every heart, giving refuge and spiritual protection. Please, will you join me in this? Then, let us each be a voice for God as we naturally emanate this Lovingkindness frequency in our lives.
Feliz Pesaj! Chag Sameach!
Stephanie Sofie Shefia Cohen
(with thanks and appreciation for my teacher R. Miles Krassen's inspiring and confirming messages)
Friday, April 10, 7:00 pm MT, ZOOM
Sephardic Shabbat
ZOOM Meeting ID: 779-141-854 | Password: rambam
PDF: SONG SHEET AND PRAYERS
Saturday, April 11, 10:00 am 12:00 noon MT,
ZOOM Special Renewal Shabbat with Rabbi Chavah Carp "Healthy Love" - The Second of 49 Steps *
ZOOM Meeting ID 749 092 949 | Password: 050734
PDF: RENEWAL SIDDUR