Jon Pushinsky and M. Jean Clickner: Personal reflections on the impact of the Pittsburgh synagogue shooting

We joined Congregation Dor Hadash as young parents over 30 years ago. We appreciated that the congregation was formed by a group of independent thinkers who were largely raised in the orthodox and conservative Jewish traditions. The congregational founders embraced their Judaism while striving to find new ways of applying ancient religious precepts to our modern world.

As the congregation grew, it aligned itself with the reconstructionist branch of Judaism. We embraced Dor Hadash’s deep commitment to the Jewish concept of tikun olam — repairing the world. And we celebrated Dor Hadash’s commitment to opening its services and programs to the broader community.

We are pleased that Congregation Dor Hadash continues as a vibrant lay-led reconstructionist congregation and that, in the face of recent events, it continues to grow. Over the past few years, we have seen many young Jews and Jewish families join the congregation, expressing support for its values, its work on behalf of the betterment of the community and its commitment to providing a Jewish education to the children. Though Dor Hadash remains lay led, it hired a rabbi in 2022, and we view her contributions as invaluable in the aftermath of the Oct. 27, 2018 atrocity.

These facts are important to a full appreciation of the devastating effects and the injurious impact of the death and destruction wreaked upon us on Oct. 27.

As members of one of the three congregations that gathered in the Tree of Life building, it is important to keep in mind that many Jewish Pittsburghers are children and grandchildren of refugees. These refugees fled their native lands to escape religious persecution and the religiously motivated deadly violence perpetrated against their communities.

Many of us can identify family members who perished in the pogroms of Eastern Europe and the Shoah, the Holocaust.

Our immigrant forebears embraced this country and its promise of religious equality and freedom, as have we. Jews, like other ethnic groups who came to these shores in search of a better home, have served, fought and died for the American ideal. While we carry the shared burden of past persecution, we believed that “it can’t happen here” — that the depredations heaped upon our families in the lands of our previous generations could not occur in America.

How, then, can we adequately relate the loss, pain and injury inflicted upon us as members of a targeted congregation — the recognition that America may not be a safe haven from the evil that plagued those who came before us? Can we afford to take for granted the safety we believed this country offered? We, too, have now been victims and targets of the antisemites. We are compelled to look over our shoulders, even when entering our sacred spaces, to check for the rodef, the pursuer, those we considered to be a harmless lunatic fringe.

Since Oct. 27, 2018, we can no longer afford to dismiss the threat posed by the lunatic fringe. We have had to reevaluate the openness of our Jewish institutions. We can no longer operate in the same manner as before Oct. 27.

Our world has been shaken and our security compromised. The future is uncertain. We have experienced a measure of our ancestors’ pain. The depredations heaped upon our ancestors through the ages now reverberate through us. Our lives will never be the same. The events of Oct. 27 were a metaphorical attempt by the perpetrator to pin us with a yellow star of David, the badge used to identify and discriminate against Jews since at least the middle ages.

The public has been told much about our beloved Dor Hadash co-congregants, Jerry Rabinowitz, Daniel Leger and Martin Gaynor, who were in synagogue at the time of the Oct. 27 assault. Suffice it to say here that, as Dor Hadash is lay led, we consider the roles played by Jerry, and those continue to be played by Dan and Marty in our congregation, to be integral to its operation. We count Jerry, Dan and Marty among our friends and brothers. Jerry’s ever-present smile and kindness inspire us to live better lives. Jerry’s motto, as related in court by his brother-in-law, urges us to move forward: “Sometimes it is better to be kind than to be right.”

Our own lives are diminished by the death, injuries and pain inflicted on Jerry, Dan, Marty and their families. We, along with the community as a whole, have experienced indescribable anguish. How do we move through and past the pain? How do we prove to ourselves and the world that the perpetrator of the Oct. 27 horror has not, will not and cannot prevail? How do we honor the memories of the 11 slain worshipers?

No discussion of the impact of Oct. 27 is truly complete without reference to our pursuit of recovery. We stand resilient and unbowed. In addition to the perpetual pain we feel as individuals, let these promises represent the enduring impact of the events of Oct. 27, 2018:

• We will strengthen our commitment to the Jewish faith;

• We will continue to instruct our children in the tenets of Judaism;

• We will not be deterred from performing mitzvot — commandments/good deeds;

• We will continue to engage in tikun olam — repairing the world;

• We will speak on behalf of the voiceless;

• We will offer shelter to those in need;

• We will stand with the oppressed; and

• We will strive to make the community a welcoming place to all.

By the time this statement is published, the perpetrator’s fate will have been determined. We know that whatever time the perpetrator has left on this Earth will be spent in close confinement under harsh conditions. During his remaining days, as he sits alone in his cell for hours on end, he may begin to realize the breadth of his offenses and the immeasurable magnitude of the harm for which he is responsible. Perhaps he may even begin to feel remorse.

May the memories of the 11 lost lives, Joyce Fienberg, Richard Gottfried, Rose Mallinger, Dr. Jerry Rabinowitz, David Rosenthal, Cecil Rosenthal, Bernice Simon, Sylvan Simon, Dan Stein, Melvin Wax and Irv Younger, be as a blessing to all whose lives they touched.