When We Choose Light

The Hanukkah lights shine in front windows throughout Brooklyn. My children know it’s time to light the world when the wooden dreidel platters decorate our home, the blue tablecloth comes out of the storage drawer, and the living room smells like potatoes sizzling in a pan of hot oil. Lighting the menorah is a declaration of Jewish freedom, it is a blaze of light in the darkest days of winter – something that triumphs over despair and darkness. The message of this ritual is a powerful message for all of us, it tells the story of a spark, something all children are born with. The menorah does something quietly radical. It doesn’t ask us to hide our light or wait until the darkness passes. It asks us to gather, to strike a match, and to place the light where it can be seen: in our windows, on our tables, in the center of our homes.

Hanukkah also invites us to see opportunity where we might otherwise see only challenge. It reminds us that community is strongest when it is wide enough to hold everyone. This includes seniors who carry memory and wisdom, families raising the next generation, people of different cultures, languages, and backgrounds finding common ground in shared light. When we gather across ages and experiences, we become more than a collection of individuals. We become a living community, bound not by sameness but by care, curiosity, and the belief that we are responsible for one another.

This Hanukkah, JCC Brooklyn invites you to gather without fear and to step into the light together, to hold your children close, and to remember that community is one of our greatest sources of strength. Within our JCC, we are proud to be a reflection of the world we hope to
build: diverse, inclusive, multicultural, multigenerational, and bound by care rather than sameness. Families, seniors, children, and neighbors from many backgrounds come together here, creating a small but powerful model of what it looks like to live with openness and responsibility toward one another. In a world that can feel unsteady, we choose presence over panic, connection over retreat, and courage rooted in love. May we continue to be steady for our children, carrying our shared light from our homes into our neighborhoods and beyond.