One day two old Yidden met on the street. Apparently neither was up on the latest news. “Hey did you hear? John Kerry had Jewish grandparents.

“Unbelievable!”

“Not only that but I just learned that in the last election Joe Liberman of Connecticut, an Orthodox Jew, was nominated to run for Vice President of the United States by the Democratic Party.”

That’s amazing!

“And I just learned that at one time the city of Dublin had a Jewish mayor.”

“Such a thing, who could imagine? Only in America is this possible!”

“Only in America” - those are the words that people use to describe their adopted land. Amazed by the daily marvels that they witness in this miraculous land of ours, they’re constantly reminding themselves and others that America is unlike any other place that Jews have ever lived. As we look back and turn the pages in our American Jewish picture album, we can honestly say that they’re not completely wrong.

This past week American Jewry marked a momentous occasion - the 350th anniversary of American Judaism. It was celebrated in Manhattan with concerts, festivals and a reenactment of the first arrival. As we celebrate Rosh Hashanah, or Yom HaZikaron, the day of remembrance, when we look back at our lives and give a full accounting of our actions, it stands to reason that we should also recall our own history. What have we learned over the course of the past 350 years? What have we accomplished?

We Jews tell many extraordinary stories. Jewish life has risen and fallen many times. We recall Greek speaking Jews in Alexandria, Talmudic academies of Babylonia, Jewish poets and philosophers who served in the courts of Spanish sultans, and the rich Jewish culture in East Europe. But no story is more extraordinary than the one we tell here in America. In 350 years we have grown from a handful of people to the most powerful Jewish community that has ever existed. Yet the final verdict is not in yet on American Jewry. We’re both the strongest and the weakest of all communities. We wonder. Where will we be 50 years from now? How about 25 years? How about next year? What lies ahead – renaissance or ruin?

I imagine sitting with a large scrap book, a precious heirloom passed on from generation to generation by Jews who made America their home. Each page is a year and each section a generation. Pictures and mementos reveal an unfolding narrative of Jewish life.

On page 1 we find a sketch of 23 storm-tossed Portuguese Jews standing in New Amsterdam. After fleeing persecution in Spain and Portugal, they settled in the Dutch colony Recife, Brazil. But they were forced to flee again when the Inquisition caught up with them. Sixteen boatloads of Jews left Brazil in 1654. One boat went astray in a storm and was captured by pirates. When a French ship rescued the Jewish families, they were set ashore in the nearest Dutch colony.

The Spanish Portuguese Jews remained in the new world at the behest of the Dutch West Indies Company. They became the first of many waves of Jews to seek refuge here with the hope of building a new life. They founded the Spanish Portuguese Synagogue in New York. Yet 350 years later few of their descendents are still around to be honored by the Jewish community. There are non-Jews who can say “My ancestors came to here on the Mayflower,” or, “I’m a daughter of the American Revolution.” But most of the early descendents who came to America in the first 200 years of our history are no longer Jewish. Their descendents disappeared into the fabric of American life. In fact few American Jewish families have survived more than four generations in this nation without succumbing to assimilation.

We turn the pages to 1883. A new wave of Jews has left its mark on this country. They came from Germany and Austria and were a product of the great emancipation. For the most part they were Reform Jews. In 1883 the first class of American rabbinical students was ordained in Cincinnati, Ohio at Hebrew Union College. To mark the occasion Jewish leaders came to celebrate. A dinner was held at an exclusive French restaurant, but when the first course is brought out – little neck clams and soft shell crabs - a number of students and teachers walked out of the restaurant shocked by the non-kosher cuisine. Two years later the Jewish Theological Seminary was founded and Conservative Judaism was born. It was an effort to reject classical Reform Judaism and to preserve traditional Judaism while addressing the needs of the modern world.

A second theme emerges in this great narrative: Judaism needs to be redefined to meet the needs of Jews living in a new land while still maintaining tradition. America is not like any place Jews had ever lived before. Religion is an important but so is personal autonomy. After all, isn’t this a nation where every person has a right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness? America is a land of contradictions. Religious standards are important but so is freedom of choice. How do we navigate our way between the two?

Jonathan Sarna, in his recently published book on American Jewry, suggests that part of our historic struggle as American Jews is in the area of defining boundaries. He writes, “Religious groups, like states and countries, are necessarily demarcated by boundaries that define who is in and who is out.” Authority and leadership, too, have been a source of conflict in American Jewish life. Those struggles are not new – we see that they began back in the nineteenth century!

For many, Conservative Judaism is either reaction to Reform Judaism or a rejection of Orthodoxy. But what are we searching for? Is it enough to reject what we don’t believe in without affirming what we do? Most of us find our way to the Conservative Judaism simply because we’re rejecting all the other possibilities. “I don’t believe in Orthodoxy and I could never be a Reform Jew,” we say. But no religious community has ever thrived by rejection rather than affirmation.

We skim through the pages and now it’s 1948. A congregation is being founded in Oceanside, New York, by a group of families who have moved here from Brooklyn. They want a religious school that will educate their children, a shul where families can sit together and a center that will create a hub of Jewish life and culture. They’re busy working hard to grasp the American dream, and there’s little time for their parent’s old traditions at home. But they have fond memories and hope that those memories will live on.

A few pages more and it’s 2004. Here are young people sitting together in the OJC library trying to imagine what type of Jewish future their children will have. They’re discussing Jewish education, synagogue life, and Jewish identity. They want their children to be Jewish but they are not sure how to make this happen. They’re the fourth generation – will they overcome the fourth generation rule that haunts the first centuries of Jewish life in America? Will their children be Jewish?

Jewish life has changed. Today we’re more likely to use words like spirituality than ethnicity. And at a time when there are unlimited possibilities for their children, Judaism is only one choice among many. They’re secularly more educated than previous generations and yet less knowledgeable about their own way of life than any other group of Jews. There are more books and resources available about Judaism today than ever before and yet they are less curious and inquisitive than any other Jewish community. They’re busier but also lonelier. Yet they are not willing to let go of tradition. They wonder how Judaism fits into their lives.

Many of them feel something is missing in their lives. They want to give their children more than they received. But the synagogue can’t do that, at least not by itself. Unless they figure out how to become a living, doing, caring, and learning community, Judaism will remain distant and foreign to their lives.

They want a community, but communities make demands. Communities have boundaries and standards. You have to contribute to be a part of a community. You have to follow the rules. And you have to be willing to trade some of independence to belong to a community. And that flies in the face of their American spirit in which each person does K’yashar b’aynav – that which is right in his own eyes.

Of course, creativity and individuality are also essential to a vital and dynamic community. But to be a part of any group you have to be willing to blend your personal desires with the good of others. So they struggle. American Jews can go almost anywhere and do anything they want – but there is a price they must pay.

The next page is blank, but I have my own dreams about what it might contain. It’s a picture of a dynamic congregation of learners, where people come to discover what Judaism has to offer and wrestle with the place of Judaism in their lives. People gather to read the texts and ask questions about our heritage day and night. A day does not pass without classes and lectures and our library is a hub filled with people who are looking for new insights into Judaism. And above the door of the synagogue are the words “Zeel Gemor” – Enter and learn.

It is a community where each of us is at a different level on the ladder of Jewish living. It is a place where we help one another by mentoring and teaching each other along the way. We celebrate our differences and encourage our personal growth. Each person is respected for what he does, what he is trying to do, and not how high he has manages to climb.

It is also a caring community. The synagogue is a place where people call each other and comfort each other, where they know each other’s names, and where no event in a person’s life is ever too small or too large to be acknowledged. It’s a community where people are keenly aware that the events in the morning paper must be addressed with compassion and justice, where we reach out to help those in needs. It is a community dedicated to Tikkun Olam.

My congregation is a place that celebrates every aspect of Jewish culture and life; where nothing Jewish is foreign; where people are encouraged to bring the richness of Judaism to the things they feel most passionate about, and where they bring their life experiences into the exploration of Judaism.

It’s a community where Jewish life is lived not just in the walls of this building but in the warmth of our homes. The synagogue is but the hub of a greater community. It’s not a surrogate, but a resource that challenges and helps each person become the best person that he or she can be. It’s a place where we plant seeds for the future by nurturing them today.

The next chapter in the American Jewish album is not yet written. It’s up to us to write it. It cannot be abstract and it can’t be built on nostalgia. It can’t simply be about what we want for our children if we don’t know what we want for ourselves. It must be built on conviction and faith. This new chapter won’t be about escaping persecution but about overcoming indifference. It calls for heart, knowledge, commitment, but most of all action. As we celebrate 350 years of Jewish life in America, we must ask ourselves what it means to be here, and what it is we wish to give our children.

Only in America! That’s what we like to say. But the truth is our future depends only upon us.

Shanah Tova