Finding Shalom in a Divided World: How Simple Moments Renew My Faith in Humanity

On the evening of Saturday, June 21, as the United States made a major move in the current war in the Middle East, my husband and I were blissfully painting in our kitchen. 

I had bought him a gift of 40 scratch-off date ideas for Father’s Day, and the first one we randomly selected was the challenge of painting each other’s portraits. 

Over a spread of cheese, fresh bread, and fruit, and LOTS of paint supplies, we laughed as we attempted to capture each other’s likeness on canvas. 

Let’s just say, we aren’t quitting our day jobs. It wasn’t until much later, when I made the mistake of logging onto social media, that I learned about the air strikes that took place a world away. 

(courtesy)

This past year, the news has been almost unbearable. 

Social media and the constant barrage of headlines on my phone only amplify the feeling of dread that hangs over me most days. 

I hover between the urge to bury my head in the sand and remain blissfully ignorant, and the desire to stay educated and speak out against all the injustice I see in world. It’s exhausting. It’s only in the quiet moments, like time spent in our kitchen with my husband, laughing over a bottle of wine, that I can forget and relax. Much like how, on Shabbat, a time to unplug, there is a sense of peace, of being “in the moment.” 

The following morning, there was a message in our family WhatsApp thread from my cousin in Germany. She wanted to know how we, as Americans, were taking the news and to hear our perspective on what was happening. I pondered what to say, especially as other family members in the group don’t necessarily see eye to eye on the current political administration. Then I think about the fact that I no longer align with the progressives in the political party I once supported with my votes and my dollars, a party whose ideals I still believe in, but whose extremists spew sentiments that contribute to the rise in antisemitism. I feel abandoned, without an anchor, not knowing where I belong anymore. 

When I think about the world I grew up in compared to now …

I mourn the sense of hope and excitement I once held for the future. 

I recently found an old journal I kept in 1990, right before my 16th birthday. In it, I had written about an evening I’d spent with my family shortly after the fall of the Berlin Wall. The following is an excerpt:

“Regina (my cousin) talked to me a lot about a trip to Israel I could go on next year. She was all for it. She showed me pictures of my family when they were younger and just out of the concentration camps. I saw my grandmother and grandfather and my great aunts and uncles. It was an interesting evening. Something my father told me that night in the car I will always remember, and just in case I do happen to forget, I will always have his comment on paper (or in my computer memory bank) . . . ‘By the grace of God, you were born now instead of then, when you could have been killed just for being Jewish.’ It’s true, too. I think we are as close to peace as we have ever been.”

Sala and Harry Werthaiser, taken after immigrating to the United States. (courtesy)

I wonder about my Grandparents

As survivors of the Holocaust who came to America to escape the antisemitism they experienced in Europe, I wonder what they would think of the world today. When I think about the world my daughters are inheriting as they embark on their own journeys as young adults, I worry. I pray that the pendulum will swing back in the other direction and that there will be peace in their lifetime that we have yet to achieve.

As I was watering our lawn earlier this week, my neighbor drove by and waved. This is a man who has always been an example of “love thy neighbor.” He brings us fresh-cut flowers from his garden. His granddaughter played with my daughter when she visited many years ago. He attended my daughters’ Bat Mitzvahs. He even came over unexpectedly on Passover to wish us well, and ended up joining our whole family for our Seder. We’ve had philosophical conversations about human nature in our yards as fireflies swirled around us.

He is Iranian. Much of his family is still back in Iran. 

We’ve had conversations multiple times about how most people in the world hold moderate views and want peace, but are drowned out by extremists on both sides, many of whom hold power in the world governments. After October 7, he came to my home to check in with us and make sure we were okay. So this week, I went to his home with fresh roses to check on his well-being and make sure his family was safe. He took my hand in his and thanked me in his kind voice. He told me how the Iranian people want to see an end to the current regime and that, despite how we both feel about the current administration in America, something needed to be done. 

In a world often divided by conflict and chaos, it is the quiet, meaningful moments with my family that provide me with peace. It is time spent with others, like my neighbor, that offer me hope and remind me that beneath our differences, we share common desires for peace, safety, and connection. It is in these simple yet profound experiences that I find a sense of shalom—a wholeness that renews my faith in humanity and in the possibility of a more compassionate world.