Rabbi Ammiel Hirsch reflects on this era of instant gratification and “alternative facts” and reminds us: Jewish tradition is emphatic that there are no shortcuts in life.

Rabbi Ammiel Hirsch responds to President Trump’s immigration ban and announces a congregational refugee relief trip to Greece and Germany. “Step into the shoes of the refugee,” he says. “Try to imagine yourself on a tempest-tossed rickety boat fleeing Assad’s chemicals and ISIS’s brutalities. Don’t you remember? Just think back two or three or four generations. We Jews were on those boats — the wretched refuse that no one wanted. The world shut its doors to us, too.”

Rabbi Ammiel Hirsch reminds us that we must always preserve and defend the Jewish tradition’s core values. “Our greatness is not only in cherishing and speaking of these values, but in living up to them and instilling them in the lifeblood of the nation.”

Reflecting on hate speech that has recently plagued the small Jewish community of Whitefish, Montana, Rabbi Ammiel Hirsch considers the words of Martin Luther King Jr.: “All that is required for evil to triumph is for good people to do nothing.”

Through the lens of the biblical story of Joseph’s reunion with his brothers, Rabbi Ammiel Hirsch reflects on a deeply Jewish idea: that there is a guiding force in the universe.

“Joseph could not unravel what forces brought him to the throne of Egypt. He only senses a deep connection between events that was mystical, even magical. He described this feeling as God and destiny.”