Eternal Boundaries, 11 Days of the Omer
Today is eleven days, which is one week and four days of the Omer in the year 5783. נצח שבגבורה, Netzach ShebeGevurah, Eternal Boundaries.
What are the red lines?
Living an ethical life means cultivating a sense of right and wrong.
Knowing what we will do, and what we wont do.
When someone rings the doorbell, choose to answer or ignore it.
Never greet a stranger by shooting at their head. Least of all a child.
How do we continue to make good choices?
We should all be outraged at the shooting of Ralph Yarl.
In our own lives, how do we continue to make good choices?
How do we keep calm when a child has been refusing simple instructions for 10 minutes?
How do we show as much empathy for our family as we do at work?
If we’re tired or hungry (or both), how do we stick to the right path?
The Daily Work of Religious Practice
Whether we choose to prayer daily,
or rarely,
Our goal should be living into righteousness.
Honoring the eternal boundaries we’ve drawn.
Living into the values we espouse.
Ethics isn’t about hard cases;
Ethics is about making the right choices even when we’re stretched beyond our limits.
We can choose
To observe when we raise our voices,
and think through how to act differently the next time.
To monitor when we speak cynically or sarcastically,
and challenge ourselves to embody authenticity rather than derisiveness.
To offer as much of ourselves as we have space for,
and not feel guilty for saying no when appropriate.
To honor the humanity within us,
as much as we honor the humanity around us.
Image by David Mark from Pixabay.