Re-introductions

Beloved reader,

Today, I’d like to reintroduce myself—because some of you are new, and for many of you, it’s been a while.

And sometimes, it’s good to review.

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A little over 3,000 people read this—The 77% Weekly—my 40/52 weeks-per-year spiritualigious newsletter.

All but two readers receive it electronically, like you are.

Two readers—James and Damen (you know who you are)—are inmates in the California prison system. They read the articles printed out and mailed to them by Robin, who I thank again for volunteering to do so.

Most readers didn’t expect to have a rabbi in their lives.
Most readers think of me as either “rB” (Ar-bee) or Rabbi Brian.
Most readers have been receiving this newsletter for more than two years.

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Some of the words from these newsletters were recently edited into a book entitled Rabbi Brian’s Highly Unorthodox Gospel.

rB’s_HUG (the book’s clever acronym) is about deconstructing the sense that God is outside and breaking down the barriers people have built up—barriers that keep them from loving and feeling loved.

This Kickstarter-funded book is creeping up on 1,000 units sold.
(This is amazing.)

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I wrote above that the book is “about deconstructing the sense that God is outside.”

This is a big idea for many people.

Let me explain it quickly:

As children, most of us absorbed the idea that God is outside of us. But that’s not true.

As I write in the book:

The universe is not asking us to be its child but instead asks us to partner and wake up to life. We are not to be less than but to be a part of (not apart from) creation.

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Some background as to how I came to do what I do.

After nearly ten years of attending Tannen’s Magic Camp as a camper, in 1987, I became one of the two youngest counselors on staff.

I suspected then—and later life confirmed—that I had a gift for teaching.

Teaching a roomful of people how to make it seem like a rubber band is jumping from hand to hand landed me a job teaching math for The Princeton Review, a national college prep course provider. Their entire interview process was: “Teach us something in less than five minutes.”

And so, I went from teaching magic to teaching math.

However, because I was curious to learn more about my tradition, religion, and culture (Judaism is all and each), I went to rabbinical school and took jobs teaching the Judaism I had learned.

I did that until—for reasons that wouldn’t become clear until a decade later—I just couldn’t do it anymore. So I went back to teaching math to high school students, sprinkling bits of wisdom into my classes.

Today, I say I’ve graduated from high school and have set my eyes on helping adults deconstruct religious baggage and allow themselves to love and be loved.

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I run a service on Saturday mornings, live on the web.
It’s not like what I was taught to do in rabbinical school.

The group’s focus is constantly, time and time again, repeatedly, over and over, incessantly, unfailingly—and yet again—LOVE.

There’s more on the website: ROTB.org.

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I am honored to write this newsletter for you to enjoy.

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This newsletter is free. And not. The salary I take and the machinery required to run this outside-the-box nonprofit organization cost real-world dollars.

I ask folks, if they are able, for an annual donation of $77.
Would you, please?

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Beloved,

Won’t you commit to saying one more kind thing today than you did yesterday?

I hope so.

I’m honored to be your rabbi.