Hope, Clarity, and Purpose: CCAR Chief Executive Rabbi Hara Person’s 2025 Convention Address

The 136th annual Convention of the Central Conference of American Rabbis was held March 23-26, 2025, in downtown Chicago, where over 450 Reform rabbis gathered in person and online. Here, we share CCAR Chief Executive Rabbi Hara Person’s moving address acknowledging the incredible work of Reform rabbis, the blessing of leading the Jewish people, and the importance of finding clarity and purpose in these challenging times.

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Watch the video, or read the address below.

Welcome to the first ever CCAR Asefah! After decades of calling this the CCAR Business Session, this is now the Asefah. Why? Because we listened to colleagues, who told us that the term “business session” didn’t properly convey what we did here. As The Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew and English Lexicon reminds us, the root asaf is related to gathering, to being gathered, and to harvesting. And indeed, more than just “business,” this session is our annual gathering—the annual harvesting of the work of the CCAR. 

This week’s parashah, P’kudei, coincidentally the same Convention parashah as last year’s, speaks about the whole and the parts. There is the mishkan, that miraculous construction of artistry and faith, made up so very many parts. And there are the sacred vestments, also made up of different parts: the breastpiece with its stones representing the totality of Israel, the rings of gold, and the chains, and the cords, and the ephod.

The CCAR too is made up of the whole and parts. I’ve found it interesting to hear people talk about the CCAR as some abstract, amorphous organism that operates on its own free will. Actually, the CCAR is you, and me, the board, and the amazing staff we have in this room and elsewhere. We are all part of how and why the CCAR operates. You, the members, give us, the staff, our purpose and reason to exist, and I hope that the staff and I give you tools and resources to achieve your purpose, along with the chevrah and sense of community that strengthens you to do your sacred work. We, together, are the CCAR.

Of course the work of the CCAR is not just the staff, but also the board, and all the many, many volunteers who give their time and ideas to keep all the work going, and all of you who support the work of the CCAR in so many, many ways. Thank you to all the chairs and members, too many to mention, and forgive me for not mentioning every name, or we’d be here all day—thank you to all of you who roll up your sleeves and do the work of our committees and task forces and working groups, thank you to all who give what you can of your resources, your time, your ideas—you are the engine that drives the CCAR. Thank you to the board, both the outgoing and the incoming, whose level of commitment and partnership is so extraordinarily high.

And two exceptional people. Rabbi Erica Asch: I don’t think she realized what she was getting into when she became president, but wow did she jump in with both feet. I am going to miss you so much, but luckily you’re still on the board for two more years as our immediate past president. In these two years of her presidency, we have been through so much together—some of the usual work of the board, and some highly unusual. In this time, Rabbi Erica has become a trusted friend and advisor. I have learned so much from her and have tremendous admiration for how she approaches problem-solving and thinks through the hard stuff with clarity and integrity. Thank you, thank you.

And Rabbi David Lyon, I’m so very excited to be working closely with you the next two years. There’s a lot to do, and I am glad that we’ll be doing it together. If these last few weeks, even these last few days, are any indication, I know we’re going to learn a lot together, do important work for the CCAR, challenge each other in all the best ways, and have fun doing it. Thank you for stepping up, and thanks in advance for all the ways I’m going to grow under your leadership, and the CCAR is going to grow.

Like the biblical mishkan, the CCAR is complex, and multifaceted, made of many parts, and many people each playing their important part, each bringing the best that is in them to make a strong and beautiful whole. So it is for each beautiful element of the mishkan and of the sacred vestments—each one of those dazzling fabrics and stones serves a purpose and matters—and so it is for us as rabbis. What you do matters, and I want to thank you for all the ways you carry your individual leadership. Teaching Torah, leading prayer, bringing comfort, opening doors, moving chairs, raising money, writing, protesting, managing budgets, committee work, coalition building—the elevated and the quotidian—it is not all glamorous, but it is important and necessary. In the words of Marge Piercy [i]:

I love people who harness themselves, an ox to a heavy cart,
who pull like water buffalo, with massive patience,
who strain in the mud and the muck to move things forward,
who do what has to be done, again and again.

Thank you for everything you do as rabbis, in all the ways you do it, the work of mala and mata.

There is a flip side though to all of that breathtaking beauty of the mishkan and the priestly garments described in this parashah. Those vestments must have been quite a load to bear. I’m imagining the weight of the layers of linen, the gold, and all the stones, the ruby and the emerald and the turquoise, all of those bright and beautiful but substantial stones on the priests’ shoulders and backs, weighing them down with responsibility and mission.

As the inheritors of these communal leadership roles, we continue to carry the load of these sacred garments. It has been quite a few years of extremely heavy burdens on us. We thought things were challenging before. And suddenly the landscape is even tougher.

If these vestments of leadership imbue us with strength and power, to what end? Do these vestments transmit awe and authority, or might they sometimes also become a form of constraints, keeping us always conscious of the role we play vis-à-vis those we serve? These vestments may identify us as the bearer of special status and power, but they can also be bindings that restrict us.  

In an uncertain and ever-roiling world, it’s so important that we articulate our own clarity of purpose. Where do we remain quiet for the sake of sh’lom bayit within our community, or even within our homes, and where do we speak out? On what are we willing to take a risk? Where do the stakes feel so high that we must speak out, even if there are consequences, and where are stakes so high that we cannot speak out? 

We rabbis are teachers, preachers, healers, pastors, thought leaders, organizational leaders, strategists, innovators, challengers of the status quo. The responsibility of leadership that we carry can be a burden, but it doesn’t have to be so heavy if we can identify our mission. That sense of purpose can guide us and give us strength, remind us where we’re trying to go and why.

Identifying a personal mission is a process of discernment that can be ongoing, but today, I want to share four elements of my mission at this moment with you.

First, I am here to serve you: to hear your needs and your ideas, to think about what you need today, and envision what you might need tomorrow. This often means pivoting as needs change—and, it does not always mean saying yes, but it does mean listening and considering.

What it does mean is hearing you, helping you out with challenges, me or others on the CCAR staff. It has meant figuring out immediate needs in times of natural disasters, global pandemics, and wars. It means, just as some examples, offering webinars on antisemitism, offering Shekels, our fundraising seminar, and a multi-session course on facilitating difficult conversations. It means starting a series for rabbis going into retirement or a support group for those coping with despair. It has meant working with our partner organizations to engage in the work we should be doing together—the URJ, the ACC, ARJE, and more. It means taking a group of rabbis to Israel every year to connect with our MARAM colleagues and to stay current with the reality on the ground.

Second, I am here to serve the future of the rabbinate. How can I be strategic about what we will need tomorrow? With whom should I be in conversation? What do we need to put in place today in order to be ready for tomorrow? How can we think practically to prepare for tomorrow, and how can we dream about what might be possible? That means policy changes in the office of career services, like a new policy requiring search committees to engage in anti-bias training, or in our admissions policy as we expand our CCAR ranks to include more rabbis ordained from other seminaries—many of whom are already serving Reform congregations—and creating a group to help with emeritus/successor challenges. It means working with the ACC to create the Small Congregation Clergy Collab to serve small congregations no longer being served by students, and working with the URJ to reimagine the Gold Book. It means expanding our Mishkan T’filah family of offerings to include a new Friday night service booklet and a Spanish supplementary version, both currently in the works. And it means going big and creating the Torah commentary for the 21^st century, a project that is creative and generative and will be an incredible gift for the future. 

Third, it means reconciling with our past in order to pave the way for a better tomorrow. That has meant creating an ethics department, accepting accountability for the past, engaging in the difficult, ongoing work on our ethics code and system, and continuing to update our system. It means recognizing the pain of our history in regard to the acceptance and inclusion of LGBTQ+ colleagues. It means being committed to apologizing for the past while also believing in an organization and a rabbinate that can continually learn and do better.

And ultimately, fourth, is about mustering courage and heeding the still, small voice within, pushing me to speak out for justice and our values. There is much in this broken world of ours that calls to me. Of those, I must discern, which I will speak out on publicly. Part of this role is knowing when to be quiet. But part of it is also deciding when to speak out.

I wasn’t always so concerned about the peril of speaking out, but today there can be real risks in speaking out—personally, professionally, organizationally. And, I may disappoint you, or I may anger you—either because we did speak out on something or because we did not. That is going to happen. We cannot do everything, say everything, respond to everything, nor should we.

In these challenging days I am buoyed by being in conversations with other faith groups and alliances, united in our concerns for the future of shared ideals and values. (Sidebar note: I want to apologize to the Canadians here—well, I want to apologize to you regardless, but right now this is going to sound very American-centric. And to the Israelis and Europeans, again, apologies.)

The February 2025 lawsuit that we joined with twenty-six other faith groups against the Department of Homeland Security to protect the fundamental American principle of religious freedom and the sanctity of our places of worship, along with our partners from URJ and the Conservative and Reconstructionist Movements, and also many Christian groups, is one example of this coalition work. This is a time to come together around shared values. With so much at stake we can’t afford perfect partners.

But that is far from the only issue we need to be concerned about. There is a long list: bringing the hostages home, supporting transpeople, protecting immigrants, the slashing of the federal workforce, ceasefire with Gaza, democracy itself, the climate, reproductive rights, the future of medical research, deporting people without due process, the rise in antisemitism, it is a shockingly long, and still incomplete, list.

What rises to the surface for me in this moment, not because it matters more, but because it is perhaps more stealthy in its danger, is the weaponization of antisemitism. I don’t have to tell you that we are seeing antisemitism come to the fore in ways previously unimaginable. Hate speech, defacement of Jewish property and institutions, threats of physical harm, actual violence. The list goes on. You know about the number of synagogues experiencing bomb threats, which even when thankfully false, creates an atmosphere of fear and intimidation. How many of you have had to deal with damage to property? How many of you have received threats to your personal safety or that of your families? And of course there is the very real harassment and threats of danger to Jewish students on college campuses.

The problem is that the fight against antisemitism is being championed by those who claim to love and protect Jews, while using antisemitism to take away rights. There are important questions that we must ask ourselves and each other. What is systemic and what is institutional? What is hate speech, what is incitement to violence, what is harassment? Do all expressions of antisemitism deserve our attention? Whose agenda is being served by these expressions of antisemitism, and perhaps even more importantly, whose is served by our fighting against it?

Not all of those who would fight antisemitism are our friends. As Dr. Marc Dollinger argues, philosemitism is antisemitism. Philosemites like us when it’s useful to them, but they will surely turn on us when we are no longer useful. Appeasing Jews by fighting antisemitism is a first step to taking away the civil rights and liberties of others that may very well come back to hurt us. We have seen this movie before and it does not go well for Jews. We cannot be so naïve as to believe that when the government is allowed to trample on the civil liberties of those we don’t like or don’t agree with, that it will not come back upon us. As Jews we have thrived in countries and in eras where free speech and the right to protest have been protected. How many of us owe our lives and privileges today to the grandparents or great-grandparents were afforded the rights to free speech and protest. How many of us are the descendants of garment workers, bundists, union organizers, civil rights protestors, marchers on Washington?

We cannot allow the civil liberties of others to be taken away when we don’t like what they’re saying because we will be next.

I know that there is not uniform agreement within our ranks on these issues. However, we have a long and proud history as Reform rabbis of standing up for principles that matter so deeply that we are willing to find the courage necessary to take risks. Historically, our collective mission as Reform rabbis has meant speaking up for workers’ rights, against McCarthyism, for civil rights here and in Israel, for Soviet Jewry, abortion rights, against the Vietnam War, and for democracy, just to name a few. We are a people, and a rabbinate, of deeply held values and faith that compel us to act. As Reform rabbis, we know how to speak out on injustice and be a voice for the voiceless. As Reform rabbis, it is our job to agitate, challenge, and inspire in order to create a better tomorrow. This is in our CCAR DNA.

In choosing to enter the rabbinate, we chose a life of service to the Jewish people and the Jewish future. No matter what your rabbinate looks like, we have all chosen to be part of something bigger than ourselves, bigger than our own individual needs. It is a choice that comes with responsibilities, blessings, and challenges. And it is a choice that requires clarity and courage.

True, there is too much to do, and there are limited resources and hours in the day. I am not advocating a life of martyrdom—take care of yourself so that you can be there for others and stay focused on your mission. Take your vacations and your sabbaticals, meet with your therapists and coaches, go to the gym and practice yoga, go out with your friends and spend time with your families—all the things that keep you spiritually, emotionally, and professionally healthy so that you can do the work you are called to do.

Nevertheless, as leaders in 2025, we must be courageous and we must act. Having a sense of purpose fuels the courage needed amidst the fear, anxiety, and complexity that we’re living with today. Courage doesn’t mean fearlessness. Having courage is about managing fear. Courage is the life raft we hang on to in the face of fear; it is what will lift us up out of the raging waters threatening to overwhelm us. The challenge before us is to find a clarity of purpose that matters more to us than our fear. “Clarifying the values that orient your life and work and identifying larger purposes to which you might commit are courageous acts,” write Heifitz, Grashow, and Linsky in The Practice of Adaptive Leadership.[ii]

In this particular moment, with so much at stake, we must each find the courage to stand up for something that matters to us so greatly that we must act. None of us can take on all the challenges of this moment, but we can each take on something, and in so doing, we inspire those you lead to join. Who are we if we remain silent as others are denied basic rights? And perhaps even more importantly, who are we when the denial of those rights are done in our name?

In writing about the ways in which all the community contributed to the building of the mishkan, Aviva Zornberg[iii] notes that it took great courage for the people, who did not possess the skills needed to build the mishkan, to each do what they could nevertheless. We too each have a part to play in the work before us. Let us find strength in the prophetic history of the Reform rabbinate. Let us use that history to fuel the courage we need in this moment. As Reform rabbis, we have never quietly accepted the status quo and we must not do so now.

I close with the words of one of my rabbis, Seamus Heaney, from the “Cure at Troy”:[iv]

Human beings suffer,
They torture one another,
They get hurt and get hard.
No poem or play or song
Can fully right a wrong
Inflicted and endured.

The innocent in gaols
Beat on their bars together.
A hunger-striker’s father
Stands in the graveyard dumb.
The police widow in veils
Faints at the funeral home.

History says, Don’t hope
On this side of the grave.
But then, once in a lifetime
The longed-for tidal wave
Of justice can rise up,
And hope and history rhyme.

So hope for a great sea-change
On the far side of revenge.
Believe that a further shore
Is reachable from here.
Believe in miracles
And cures and healing wells.

Call miracle self-healing:
The utter, self-revealing
Double-take of feeling.
If there’s fire on the mountain
Or lightning and storm
And a god speaks from the sky.

That means someone is hearing
The outcry and the birth-cry
Of new life at its term.
It means once in a lifetime
That justice can rise up
And hope and history rhyme.

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[i] Marge Piercy, The Art of Blessing the Day: Poems with a Jewish Theme (Knopf, 2000), 73.

[ii]  Ronald A. Heifetz, Marty Linsky, Alexander Grashow, The Practice of Adaptive Leadership: Tools and Tactics for Changing Your Organization and the World (Harvard Business Press, 2009), 39.

[iii] Avivah Gottlieb Zornberg, The Particulars of Rapture: Reflections on Exodus (Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, 2011), 474 (based on Rambam).

[iv] Seamus Heaney, The Cure at Troy: A Version of Sophocles’ Philoctetes (Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 1991).