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We are still in the midst of Passover, and since I know many of you are wondering, I’ll answer your question straight off - you can start eating bread again during dinner on Wednesday, which would be a complete 7 days after the Seder. I also recognize that some of you may not keep the food rules of Passover at all, while others may be keeping 8 days if you grew up in more observant homes; either are also acceptable in Reform tradition. 

In our home, we follow a different set of rules altogether. For years we have always abided by the “Rabbi Shook Rules of Passover” which is that you can start eating bread again once you’ve attended the Yizkor memorial service held during the late morning of the 7th day. Rabbi Shook’s rule (which, to be fair, I don’t believe he invented, but we learned it from him so he gets the credit) was that you actually had to attend the service to end your Passover a few hours early. This was particularly important because, while the Yom Kippur Yizkor service is one of the most heavily attended services of the year, the attendance on Passover is decidedly more sparse, so very few of us reaped the benefit of this rule.

Ironically, though, its small size makes this Yizkor one of the most beautiful services of the year. While on Yom Kippur, the memorial service is attended by anyone who has suffered a loss, the Passover Yizkor service is attended almost exclusively those who have lost loved ones since the previous Passover. The grief is still so fresh, and it is particularly poignant, having just set our Seder tables with one less chair, with the glaring physical absence of that loss. In the Yizkor service, we each take turns saying the name of our loved one and perhaps sharing a memory of them if we are able. Looking around the room, there is a sense of kinship and comfort at being together with those whose loss still feels so unimaginable.

This year, of course, things are different. Since the Yizkor service is by nature so intimate and personal, it didn’t feel right to host it in an empty sanctuary without giving people the opportunity to share. Yet that in and of itself is a loss, and it’s one that I feel deeply. My father passed away two months ago today; and one month ago, the end of the shloshim (30 day) period of mourning, was marked by the first day of our quarantine. These past weeks have felt like one loss after another, some with clear Jewish pathways to note and honor them; others, like the loss of routines, of hugs from friends, of milestones and celebrations, seem impossible to mark. It feels like a constant state of mourning, yet there have also been surprising joys: the added closeness I feel with my family, the time to refrain from the regular routines that make up most of daily life and examine my priorities and hopes in a way that the busyness of life never allows.

I have found that one of the psalms included in the Yizkor service has brought me more comfort and challenged me these last two months. Psalm 91 reads, “God is my refuge and my fortress, my God in whom I trust…You will not fear the terror of night, nor the arrow that flies by day, nor the pestilence that stalks in darkness, nor the plague that destroys at midday…If you make the Most High your dwelling, God, my refuge, then no harm will befall you, no disaster will come near your abode.”  

The author of Psalm 91 could very well have been writing for each of us, seeking a way to be unafraid of the sickness around us, trying to find God’s presence in our homes even as we ache to get beyond our own four walls. In these times of sadness and uncertainty, may we find comfort in these words, even if we can’t come together in person to share our loss.