Rabbi's Chayva's Chat

The Am Tikvah Board Meeting started this week with a motion that I don’t think you would have heard at synagogue board meetings in New York or L.A.: a moment of silence for Willie Mays, who passed away on Tuesday, June 18. As Giants Chairman Greg Johnson said, Mays was “a true legend in the pantheon of baseball greats, [whose] combination of tremendous talent, keen intellect, showmanship, and boundless joy set him apart. He had a profound influence not only on the game of baseball, but on the fabric of America.” Needless to say, the board meeting motion was granted and we sat quietly for a moment with the memory of the Say Hey kid.

I am not the first to note the poignant timing of his passing. The next day was Juneteenth, the national holiday commemorating the complete ending of legal slavery in the United States. Though President Biden signed Juneteenth into law only three years ago, its history and its celebration reach back much further. On June 19, 1865, the Union soldiers landed in Galveston, Texas to announce that the war was over and enslaved people were now free. It took them two and a half years after the Emancipation Proclamation to make it there, and Black Americans have continued to endure and overcome disproportionate challenges born of racism and prejudice. For more history, as well as ritual, I recommend Rabbi Heather Miller’s Haggadah for Juneteenth.

One day after Juneteenth and two after Willie Mays’ passing, was to be a celebration of him as the Giants played the Cardinals at Rickwood Field in Birmingham, Alabama, where he first played. When Mays knew he wasn’t going to make it, he wrote a note to be shared: “Birmingham, I wish I could be with you all today. This is where I’m from. I had my first pro hit here at Rickwood as a Baron in 1948. And now this year, 76 years later, it finally got counted in the record books. Some things take time, but I always think better late than never. Time changes things. Time heals wounds. So I want you to have this clock to remember those times with me and remember all the other players who were lucky enough to play here at Rickwood Field in Birmingham. Remember, time is on your side.”

May time be on the side of all those who wish to change the game - the game of baseball, and the game of democracy. May the memory of those who did change the world compel us to bring a more just future. Happy Juneteenth, and may Willie Mays’ memory always be a blessing.