Mitzvah projects are good, but activism is even better, said Sherrie Tussler, speaking to about 50 synagogue congregants on Sunday.
Tussler, executive director of the Hunger Task Force of Milwaukee, sugar coated nothing. Speaking at “Mitzvah Day,” at Congregation Emanu-El B’ne Jeshurun in River Hills, the head of the major Milwaukee food bank and lobbyist organization called for action.
“I’m glad that the kids are doing service because they should be doing service,” she said, adding that it’s a way to get them thinking, but that they should also be reminded to get involved. “Service is good. Having a voice is twice as good.”
“We don’t just need a can of food. We need your vote. We need your voice. We need you to care. We need you to question why people are hungry. We need you to wonder and worry every single day about what’s going on in Milwaukee that we are now the second poorest city in the nation, that we have a poverty rate that’s almost 40 percent and we’re OK with that when we lay down at night and put our head on the pillow.”
Years ago, “we didn’t have widespread homelessness and hunger when I was in high school,” she said. In Milwaukee, she said “there is an extreme level of poverty and we’ve come to accept it.”
She lauded Mitzvah Day. She praised the Jewish Community Pantry – an effort cosponsored by the Harry and Rose Samson Family Jewish Community Center and Women’s Philanthropy of the Milwaukee Jewish Federation – but asked her audience to think about the increase in poverty over decades. “We went from having, oh, St. Benedict’s Downtown, to suddenly needing 20 soup kitchens dotting the city.”
Tussler said the root cause of homelessness is capitalism, moving wealth from people with less to people with more. The comment may have helped prompt one congregant to later raise his hand, taking issue with the notion and asking about raising money from capitalists while criticizing capitalism. Tussler laughed it off, saying her corporate supporters understand she’s a “hippie.”
The Hunger Task Force has advocated for the quality of federally-funded food in schools, dignified access to food, and on other issues related to hunger. Tussler has testified before Congress.
She said the food stamp program is not intended as a permanent solution, its cases are reviewed and eligibility is based on income and assets. She called it the first line of defense, saying it’s been unfairly maligned and, in fact, “the food stamp program works.”
“We want you guys to think about who you vote for, who you try to influence, what issues you’re concerned about and whether or not your voice matters,” she said, speaking on Sunday, May 22, 2016. “The political process is one that gives people money or it doesn’t give people money.”
There was some laughter when she said she doesn’t care for the song, “Waiting on the world to change.”
“Don’t wait for the world,” she said. “Change the world.”
2,000 mitzvahs
Beyond Tussler’s talk with congregants, many others were engaged in Mitzvah Day activities, including creating 2,000 “snack packs” of food for the Hunger Task Force and 35 loaves made for Meta House of Milwaukee, among other activities, said Dana Michael, a co-coordinator of Mitzvah Day.
The congregation does Mitzvah Day every year, in an effort to “make the world a better place and help others,” Michael said.
Upstairs from the Hunger Task Force speech, Emma Kantrowitz, 8, was cutting pineapples with other synagogue children. Edible Arrangements of 722 N. Water St. in Milwaukee was leading the project.
“We’re taking pineapples and we’re making them into Jewish stars,” Emma said. There were also flower shapes, with all of it being placed on sticks and into vases.
“Soon we’re going to give them away,” she said. “It’s a mitzvah to give other people things that they can’t have.”
***
“Mitzvah” literally means commandment, as in one of the 613 commandments in the Torah, but the word is also sometimes used to refer to any good deed.
Loading ...