New Year Greeting from Rabbi Stern

One of the wonderful features of video games is the ability to rise from the dead. It’s so reassuring to know that even if you make a mistake—fall into a pit of fire, get bitten by a zombie, or shot by the bad guy—all you have to do is reset and keep going.

 

The High Holy Day experience is not a video game. It is a loving reminder that we have one life: precious, beautiful, challenging, and utterly unique. We can’t simply undo our mistakes or erase our moments of insensitivity with the press of a button. But we can do something even more meaningful—we can work to repair what we’ve broken through the sacred practices of atonement, and forgiveness.

 

These days offer us what no video game can: the opportunity for genuine transformation. Not a reset, but a renewal. Not an escape from consequence, but a path toward healing and growth.

 

So come join your fellow TBA travelers in this most human of quests—the work of living with greater intention, compassion, and wisdom. Be part of welcoming a new year filled with new possibilities and the ancient hope that we can always begin again.



This isn’t a game. This is the real thing.