This invocation was given at the 78th annual George Washington Letter Reading Event, August 17, 2025 (23 Av, 5785), held by the Touro Synagogue Foundation to celebrate the famous 1790 letter exchange between the Jewish community of Newport, Rhode Island (represented by warden Moses Seixas) and first president of the United States, George Washington. Washington’s response to Seixas’s letter, in which he quotes some of his most iconic phrasings, is one of the first official statements by the US government on the value of religious freedom. This Letter Reading Event was held in the Old Colony House (where the Jewish community’s letter was probably presented to President Washington), rather than in the Touro Synagogue, due to Congregation Shearith Israel in New York’s barring of the Touro Synagogue Foundation from access to the building. . . .

A prayer for Uvalde and for all of us, from a little over three hours away, up the road in Austin… . . .

A prayer for the medical workers and researchers on the front lines of treating the afflicted and finding a cure for the COVID19 coronavirus pandemic. . . .

A prayer composed in the aftermath of the mass murder of the Dor Ḥadash community at the Ets Ḥayyim (Tree of Life) Synagogue in Squirrel Hill, Pittsburgh on Shabbat morning 27 October 2018. . . .

A worker’s prayer by Rabbi Stephen Belsky, dedicated to Noam Ezra ben haRav Moshe z”l. . . .

As חז”ל [Ḥazal] taught us, on ראש השנה [Rosh Hashanah] we elevate puns from the lowest form of humor to the highest religious experience. The foods suggested by our Sages had names in Aramaic or Hebrew that symbolized hopes for the new year — here is a list of foods with English names for those of us for whom English is our vernacular. . . .

This is the piyyut, עֵת שַׁעֲרֵי רָצוֹן (Eit Shaarei Ratson) by Rabbi Yehuda ben Shmuel ibn Abbas (12th century Aleppo, Syria (born in Fez, Morocco)). The English translation presented here is by Rabbi Stephen Belsky. . . .

This piyyut is signed “Elyaqim Ḥazaq.” Alas, we do not know who this Elyaqim was or even whether he was a rabbinic or Karaite Jew. The piyyut has been preserved for us in the Karaite cycle (Vilna printing press, 1852, Vol. IV, p. 135.) and there are several other piyyutim signed with his name. . . .