JCVT is like a sukkah

I haven’t ever built a sukkah.

I’d like to next year.

I’d like to sit inside one with a book and a cup of coffee, feeling connected to my ancestors. I’d like to feel my feet on the ground and look up at the night sky, radiant in her beauty, even as the sounds of cars and the nearby soccer players mix with nature. I’d like, even for a moment, to feel connected to something bigger, something holy, something almost ethereal.

As My Jewish Learning so eloquently describes it, the sukkah is “a permeable structure, with a roof of leaves or stalks and walls that move in the wind.” It is simultaneously indoors and outdoors, sturdy and impermanent, private and public, cozy and exposed — a space that seems to open us to something beyond our ordinary sense of time.

Maybe those moments of transcendence don’t always happen. But I believe they can. And when they do, they remind us of our place on this particular patch of earth.

Vermonters understand that instinct particularly well. So much of the beauty of living here comes from our relationship with the natural world: the mountains and woods, the changing seasons, the night sky. It is part of why so many of us choose to call this place home.

I was thinking about the profound differences between Vermont and suburbia recently while attending a family bar mitzvah weekend outside Boston.

It was a gift to sit in another synagogue and see how a Massachusetts Jewish community honors its b’nai mitzvah. And, as different as the surroundings and some customs were, I was struck by how familiar the ceremonyelse felt. I recalled my own Bat Mitzvah in Montpelier so many years ago. I thought of the young leaders who would recite this same Torah portion in the years to come, even if their loved ones may not be alive to hear it.

This is what Judaism teaches us.

And it also teaches us that we can always find a Sukkah of Peace, wherever we are.

Maybe that sukkah isn’t as huge as a NYC one. Maybe that sukkah is a small one in a nearby forest, constructed by a few sticks and a blessing like the tiny one Beth built spontaneously in the garden at the start of Sukkot and is still standing! And maybe, just maybe, like me, your Sukkah might be the one that lives in your heart, the one that remembers that there are so many places to find joy, right at home.

The heart of JCVT’s work is to support this. Since Jewish Communities of Vermont doesn’t currently  have a physical home of our own, we are not defined by four walls or anchored in place. 

Sometimes the work is helping a family or an individual find and connect with their Jewish neighbors or like-minded Jews clear across the state.

Sometimes it’s supporting teens in creating a collaborative event, multi-community travel to larger Jewish communities, or participating in an interfaith Civil Rights trip.

Sometimes it means hosting a gathering virtually or in a location where Jewish life can otherwise feel difficult to find. 

Sometimes it means means making sure a book about Jewish values arrives at a child’s home.

And sometimes it simply means knowing that there is someone to call for resources and support; that wherever you live in Vermont, you are part of a wider yet deeply connected Jewish community.

Like a sukkah, JCVT is both sturdy and open. And like sukkah, JCVT isn’t fixed in place. 

Our work stretches across geography. It makes room for people to enter Jewish life in different ways. And it reminds us that a community does not have to look exactly one way, or exist inside one building, to be meaningful, and sustaining.

And like most Sukkahs, we build it together.

During Sukkot, as we consider what it means to create shelter, connection, and belonging, I hope you will help us strengthen this sukkah of Jewish life across Vermont.

Your gift to JCVT helps ensure that Jewish Vermonters, whether they live near a thriving congregation or miles from the nearest Jewish institution, can find connection, community, resources, and a sense that they belong.

Because sometimes what we need most isn’t a permanent structure.

Sometimes we simply need a place beneath the stars where we know we are not alone.

Help us keep building that place.