Make (for) yourself a teacher, acquire for yourself a friend, and judge each person for their merit.
-R. Yehoshua ben Perachya
As I write, I am on the Amtrak train returning from the Central Conference of American Rabbis’ convention in Boston. Our final speaker was Robert Putnam, the author of Bowling Alone and, more recently American Grace. In his conversation with us, Dr. Putnam shared the research that he had used for his book. His focal point was that, uniquely, the United States is an exteremely religiously devout industrialized country, but also highly tolerant of other religions. Usually, a country composed of highly devout, but many different religions is in chaos. Instead, we are more tolerant of those of other religious beliefs than we are of those with differing political views. In fact, a majority of Evangelical Christians believe that good people of other religions will be able to go to heaven, even when reminded that this is flatly contradicted by their stated theology.
You may have heard about a side result of this data. Individuals who are religious are nicer, live longer, and are more satisfied with their lives. One might ask, what does “religious” mean? (Especially considering the number of active, involved and very “Jewish” members of our congregation who come up to me and tell me they are not “religious”.) For the purposes of the study, they used two or three questions. The first was self-identification - do you belong to a religious group; if so, what group? The second was attendance at religious services. Consistently, across the religious and political spectrum, the results of “nice”-ness and satisfaction went up the more people reported they attended services.
Don’t panic. 1) You can still be nice if you do not regularly attend services. 2) The rabbi is not using this data, solely, to make a pitch for increased service attendance. (Although, the data is pretty clear.) Following up on this answer, the researchers looked deeper and found a correlation with the number of religious friends one had. To restate, the more religious friends a person has, the more likely they are to be nice, and to be satisfied in their lives. The connection is that the easiest place to make religious friends is in a religious community or institution.
So, if you have been waiting for the data, here it is - your participation in the Temple Sholom community is an act of tikkun olam and makes the world a better place. Your willingness to attend Temple events, to make friends, and to maintain those friendships, not only makes it more likely that you will be satisfied in life, but also increases the likelihood that those friends will act nicely. Small, but strong, warm and welcoming communities are the building blocks for a better society.
You belong to one. You maintain and build it by your continued presence. The more that you are present - the better the world is for you and for others.
See you soon,
Rabbi Abraham
