Growing numbers

Jeremy Corbyn this afternoon vowed to lead the opposition to any attempt to bomb ISIS in Syria as he called for a 'peaceful solution' to the threat from jihadi fanatics.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3231747/New-Labour-leader-named.html#ixzz3lYhYgK8U

Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish new year, begins at sunset on Sunday. As the Jewish year 5776 begins, the ranks of the Orthodox in the United States are growing, both in real numbers and as a percentage of the total Jewish population.
...In its 2013 "Portrait of Jewish Americans," Pew suggested that religion is a less unifying force within non-Orthodox iterations of the faith. The 53 percent who identified as Reform or Conservative Jews, for example, were less likely to keep kosher, attend Jewish services, marry other Jews, raise their children in the faith or consider religion a core aspect of life, Pew found.
Read more: http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/maryland/bs-md-orthodox-jewish-trends-20150912-story.html

This week I came across an article by Rabbi Emanuel Feldman titled If Elul comes, can nerves be far behind? One particular thought held my attention.

"Let the non-Orthodox glibly talk about tikkun olam, repairing the world. We Orthodox have more limited goals, which we call tikkun atzmi, repairing the self (which is infinitely more difficult than the abstract repairing the world."

I recalled a blog I came across in which the clergy member was very concerned about Israel’s ongoing oppression of the Palestinian people, quoting the Torah about pursuing justice when needing verses to bolster his global vision of what a fair world should look like, while disregarding the Scripture regarding individual responsibility to follow laws set forth therein. Yes, it is easier to spend one hour marching in solidarity of a people who were wronged rather than spending time on personal introspection. He need not question whether his time would be better utilized poring over a blatt gemara rather than posting about a movie he had watched, only to delete the post a number of months later.