Ashamnu

It's Yom Kippur. I've written here before about the ashamnu prayer, a traditional prayer of confession for the day. Just went over it again and was struck by how much it means to me right now.

One of the challenges of life in an era where we have so much access to information, so much capacity to weigh the consequences of sin, is to be able to do so without recoiling. To protect ourselves, we so often try to separate ourselves out and put them blame for the existence of injustice on some other group we do not belong to, in a self-deceiving attempt to avoid accountability.

The ashamnu prayer calls us back: invites us to stand, instead, to account. We, as humans, sin. The religious and the irreligious. The liberal and conservative. The privileged and the marginalized. And perhaps we can only truly reckon with sin by facing it in humility together.

And so, in troubling times, I say along with generations:

Ashamnu, Bagadnu...

We have sinned. We have dealt treacherously.

Gazalnu, Dibarnu dofi, He'evinu...
We have robbed. We have spoken slander. We have acted perversely. 

V'hirshanu, Zadnu...

We have done wrong. We have acted presumptuously.

Hamasnu, Tafalnu sheker...

We have done violence. We have practiced deceit.

Yaatsnu ra, Kizavnu, Latsnu...

We have counseled evil. We have spoken falsehood. We have scoffed.

Maradnu, Niatsnu, Sararnu...

We have revolted. We have blasphemed. We have rebelled.

Avinu, Pashanu...
We have committed iniquity. We have transgressed.

Tsararnu, Kishinu oref...

We have oppressed. We have been stiff-necked.

Rashanu, Shichatnu, Tiavnu...
We have acted wickedly. We have dealt corruptly. We have committed abomination. 

Tainu...

We have gone astray.

Titanu

We have led others astray. 

And today I pray:

O God of Israel, who led our ancestors out of Egypt and showed them their own shortcomings in a promised land, have mercy on us. 

O God, teach us to acknowledge ourselves among the transgressors. Give us strength to face the persistent of our guilt.

And God of Israel, guide us: as we learn to bind up what we've broken, to gather what we've divided, to rise (step by tiny step) above the sins we've lived with for so long.