Be inspired by the lights of the season

I have a rabbinic confession to make: I love Christmas cookies. Gingerbread men, snowflakes, and while you’re at it, peppermint bark — I appreciate the flavors and sense of the Christmas season.

I also love the hallmarks of the Hanukkah season, like fried potato latkes and sufganiyot (jelly doughnuts). Hanukkah is a Jewish holiday when we celebrate our people’s survival of Syro-Greek persecution in the Land of Israel in the second century BC. Despite the oppression, in which our Temple was desecrated and Jews were threatened with death if they would not bow down to idols, our people persevered.

As a symbol of this holiday, we have a special Jewish practice of lighting a menorah — a special eight-branched candelabra that we are supposed to put in our front window for the purpose of “publicizing the miracle.”

I could not imagine a more relevant time to do this.

We have seen a dramatic spike in antisemitism in our country since Hamas’ brutal attack on Israel Oct. 7. Jews have been threatened and attacked; Jewish synagogues and businesses have been defaced. Recently, a Jewish restaurant in Philadelphia was targeted by a mob.

Putting a Hanukkah menorah in a front-facing window this year is a statement of tremendous bravery. It shows that we will practice our tradition no matter what. It shows that we Jews know we have been persecuted before — and we will survive and even thrive.

But it isn’t just Hanukkah that inspires me this time of year. It’s also this country, the United States of America, which has been and continues to be a beacon of liberty and freedom around the world. Two centuries ago, President George Washington wrote, in his famous letter to the Jewish community of Newport, Rhode Island, that the Jewish community should feel safe and at home in this country: “For happily the Government of the United States, which gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance requires only that they who live under its protection should demean themselves as good citizens, in giving it on all occasions their effectual support.”

When I see all of the hallmarks of the season — Kwanzaa lights, Christmas trees,

Hanukkah menorahs — I know that this country is truly one of tolerance and goodness. It’s one in which liberty flourishes, one in which we are inspired by the constant struggle to live up to our values and

be a city on a hill.

This holiday season, be inspired when you see the lights of the season, and help us publicize the miracle of our diverse and beautiful society by appreciating our Hanukkah lights.

Charles "Duck" Unitas/Photo courtesy of Unitas Photography Huntington Green in Shelton was the site of a menorah lighting.

Woodward