How "political" should clergy be on the pulpit?
A perennial High Holidays dilemma for rabbis kicks into overdrive this year, because of a recent IRS ruling and because the urgency of the moment. It’s time to move beyond “nudge, nudge, wink, wink.”
I’m re-sending, in slightly adapted form, an op-ed I published last year, as a plea to my clergy colleagues on the eve of the High Holidays. Here’s the Rosh Hashanah message I could never deliver as a pulpit rabbi - and it’s a damn shame. But I can deliver it now, and I must. Existential, make-or-break elections are looming in the US and Israel. Feel free to share this with your favorite rabbi, priest, minister or imam, with my compliments!
The IRS, in a major policy shift, last year stated that religious congregations can endorse candidates from the pulpit, reversing the Johnson Amendment, as the rule was called. It is a shameless move designed to obliterate the line separating religion and state and assist conservative candidates in upcoming elections1. This tack is every bit as partisan as gerrymandering in Texas and the proposed elimination of vote-by-mail.
This move demands a countermove by progressive religious leaders, one every bit as courageous – and potentially as partisan – as those made to counter the gerrymandering by the governors of California, Illinois and other blue states.
But instead, while some Democratic candidates, like James Talarico, are embracing religious values in new and creative ways, many progressive clergy seem to be leaning toward sticking with the old practices that have been superseded1, while conservatives are using this new wrinkle as a license to bring politics into the pulpit as never before and further skew the playing field in their favor.
That’s certainly true of the center-left Jewish streams in America, which have responded to the IRS shift with a message to rabbis that nothing should change, and that partisanship – not dictatorship – is the ultimate evil.
Organized by A Perfect Union: The Jewish Partnership for Democracy,2 progressive Jewish organizations last year circulated to rabbis a collection of guidelines entitled “Leading without Endorsing,” listing a number of reasons rabbis should pretend that the Johnson Amendment is still in force.
Here’s one:
“Candidate endorsements risk over-personalizing public policy. While our tradition can, and often does, guide our positions and advocacy on issues of concern to our communities, tying those positions to specific candidates and elected officials muddies the waters. No candidate is the perfect embodiment of our communities’ views on all issues.”
I’ve never endorsed a candidate from the pulpit – and I’m not recommending that now.
But sermons can no longer just be about mere values and issues, when our future is in the hands of malevolent people, people who are literally blowing up the world. Rabbis’ messages need to be fashioned for a congregation addicted to sledgehammer postings on TikTok and X. True, no candidate is perfectly good. But a candidate can be perfectly bad. Right now, Trump and Trumpism are devastating for America, and our current president has deliberately personalized his policies, as autocrats will do. If a president is trying to act like Louis XIV and commingle his identity with the nation’s, any concern about over-personalizing public policy becomes moot.
It’s not just about values and issues: it’s about the person. And while I might not advise endorsements from the pulpit, it does not mean we can’t have outright condemnations. We are in the midst of a conflagration, and this catastrophe is being caused by human beings who have names.
A reminder, given our country’s growing addiction to violence. Condemnation need not and should not be confused with incitement. No one ever accused Amos and Jeremiah of spewing hate speech.
The missive to rabbis also asserts,
“Endorsements open the door to political coercion — including threats or promises from donors, elected officials, or interest groups for backing a candidate or party – jeopardizing your institution’s unity, integrity, or safety.”
Political coercion, threats and promises from donors have been happening ever since Moses brought down the tablets and was met by a donor-endowed golden calf (did you ever notice that donor plaque on the calf’s rump?). In any event, rabbis don’t need to endorse American candidates to be accused of “divisiveness.” Many face withering criticism over their views regarding Israel, which is not covered under IRS policies. At this fraught moment, expressing any opinion on Israel, however nuanced, automatically will draw an emotional response from just about every American Jew. There is no avoiding it. But regarding both America and Israel, this is an existential moment. if you don’t like the heat, get out of the kitchen.
This year, to avoid the topics of Israel, Trumpism and antisemitism would be a dereliction of rabbinic duty. Sure it’s uncomfortable and may alienate some. Kinda makes you wish Martin Luther King has preached about butterflies. (Oh wait, he did). Or if only Jesus had started the Sermon on the Mount with that joke about Lord and Taylor, just to soften them up.
But there’s no choice. Sure it’s uncomfortable. So a rabbi might as well speak from the heart, without constraints and start by saying, “Man, this is hard for me, but I gotta say it.” 3 The Jewish Partnership for Democracy seems more concerned with helping rabbis avoid getting fired than inspiring them to bring the (verbal) fire. The word “passion” appears not once in their guidelines.4
It’s not about endorsements. It’s about urgency. It’s about whether the sound of the shofar is going to be a clarion call to action or a sound bite for Sominex. An obsession with subtlety will only generate a chilling effect when moral clarity is needed most. At the precise moment when American Jews need courageous words from the pulpit, there will be the same old Monty Pythonesque “nudge, nudge, wink, wink” about Jewish values, artfully dodging what’s really on people’s minds in the misplaced desire to substitute abstract, feel-good illusions of unity for passionate advocacy.
Rabbis’ messages need to be fashioned for a congregation addicted to sledgehammer postings on TikTok and X. True, no candidate is perfectly good. But a candidate can be perfectly bad.
Politics happens everywhere people care about important issues and want to debate them. Such debates are inherently messy. In some cases, though not all, there is a clear and indisputable right side and wrong side. And now, it is incumbent upon those preaching core values of tolerance, kindness and equality not to waste a precious millisecond fighting a new technicality – or still abiding by old gentlemanly practices – when we should be gearing up for a more existential fight.
On these High Holidays, perhaps more rabbis will summon their inner Raphael Warnock – who does endorse candidates – and Jon Ossoff, who’s preachin’ up a storm (while the editor of a local Jewish newspaper does him the huge favor of slamming him over his - in my mind justifiable - criticism of Israeli government excesses) and finally be able to deliver honest, forceful messages from the pulpit that don’t end in some intellectualized, equivocating, “wink, wink.”
To my clergy colleagues: No more leaving it to congregants to “draw their own conclusions” about what you hope they will do. No more countering scorched-earth politics with “strongly worded statements,” filled with plausible deniability.
No more equivocating when an Israeli prime minister continuously denies responsibility for the greatest disaster in Israel’s history, one that began long before October 7 and is still going on. Ha’aretz has just documented clearly that Netanyahu was clearly warned well in advance by the UAE of the Hamas attack.
Back in the day, this is what they used to call a “smoking gun.” It’s OK to mention it from the pulpit5. And Bibi really should know better than to come running to American media to make his case in English. The guy who gloats about his ability to speak English more fluently than his rivals and to manipulate Americans is less popular over here than Trump. And that’s saying something.
No more equivocation when Donald Trump launches yet another scorched earth attack on democracy - and decency - threatening to destroy the entire post-World War Two world order. And given his track record with Covid and his approach to the economy, Iran, Ukraine and A.I., he may actually be trying to destroy the world, period. Plus he is a madman, and his recent social media postings have truly crossed every red line. It’s not funny to watch this walking train-wreck meltdown in real time as he renames New Mexico, claims ownership of the moon and physically assaults the Prime Minister of Canada. It’s sick - and we need to call it out.
On the play-for-pay front alone, Senator Chris Murphy has documented “500 days of Trump’s Corruption.”
One more point: I have great concerns about what certain Democratic pols are saying about Israel’s right to exist and I think those concerns should be addressed. But if America and Israel choose to continue on their current course in October and November, and if the elections are tainted or cancelled, none of that will matter. No Michigan senator or New York mayor can damage Israel more than an illiberal dictatorship in Washington. It’s not even close, folks. Tell your rabbi that when they try to play it safe and fall back on safe topics, the ones pre-approved by Fox News.
This is D-Day. This is Lexington and Concord. This is Gettysburg. This is 9/11.
This is it.
I wish the Johnson Amendment hadn’t been eliminated, and I do fear greatly the injection of political machinery – including dark money – into religious institutions. I fear for the future of church-state separation. But we can’t pretend that the change hasn’t happened.
It’s time to seize what the IRS has given us and run with it. On these High Holidays, no more “nudge, nudge, wink, wink.”
As the Torah and Monty Python both teach, we can’t stand Idly by.”
For instance, the Evangelical Lutheran Church is pretending that the Johnson Amendment still exists. Same with the US Catholic Church.
For a perfect example of how that can be done, see this Rosh Hashanah sermon by Rabbi Sharon Brous - about Israel, not America. I’m saying that this kind of passionate advocacy is now needed, without constraint (which the IRS has removed), woth regard to Trumpist politicians.
See this interview with Yuval Noah Harari as case in point.
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