At Keshet, we often hear from LGBTQ+ Jewish adults: “If only Keshet had been around when I was a teen.” It is a deeply relatable sentiment. I often find myself wondering what my 15-year-old self would say if she could see me now. I’m pretty sure it would go something like this:

1. Hey, your acne finally cleared up!
2. Is all that gray hair for real?
3. You are living my dream. You have a chance to fight for LGBTQ+ Jewish belonging at a higher level than ever before, alongside extraordinary people. Do it justice.

You see, when I was 15, I was fighting to establish my high school’s first LGBTQ+ affinity club (a “GSA”). On any given Wednesday, you could find me with a group of LGBTQ+ and ally friends, drafting a petition to the school board, planning a fundraiser, or eating pizza and venting about how narrow-minded so many adults in power were. Back then, if you had asked me what I wanted to do with my life, I would have told you that I wanted to be an LGBTQ+ rights advocate. (I would also have added that I dreamed of living in New York City with a wife and at least one dog, both of which have miraculously come true.)

With that GSA, I had found my purpose. And it was Keshet that catalyzed that discovery — that it was possible to be one’s full self, to build a world in which that is true for everyone. I’ve spent the ensuing decades harkening to that calling.

For this reason, and so many others, I am sure you can understand why it is such an unparalleled honor to be writing to you today as Keshet’s President and CEO.

Especially now.

We all know the stakes of this moment. I feel them every day, see them at play in the lives of those I love, as I know you do in your lives, in the lives of your partners, your loved ones, your children. We are in this together. That is an undeniable truth, and it is the only way through.

I often tell the youth in our programs that they are the inheritors of a shining legacy of resilience as LGBTQ+ and ally Jews; with every breath they draw, they carry and continue that legacy. We all do. As we learn from our Jewish tradition, this world was created for each of them. For each of us (Sanhedrin 37a:15). Every day at Keshet, we strive to enliven and make it better.

Our institutional change work, our life-affirming programs, our tireless advocacy — all of it springs from a well of deep knowledge that the best world any of us could ever envision is one in which we can all thrive as our full, wholehearted, authentic selves. And that world is an undeniably, irrepressibly joyful one.

When I need a reminder that we have what it takes to bring about that world, I often find myself turning to the following quote: 

“[If we] could be legislated away, could be made obsolete by hate and fear, this would have happened thousands of times before. But we are still here and fighting, and this is proof that nothing can take us away. I encourage you to rely on your community and let your community rely on you. We are always stronger together.”

Those words could have been said by any one of the activists who railed against injustice and police brutality during the Stonewall Riots; by any one of the activists who tended to their ill friends, protested in the streets, danced at night during the height of the AIDS crisis. They could have been said by any Jewish person who marveled at our people’s survival.

In reality, they were said by Roi, he/him, 18, a Keshet leader and former youth Shabbaton participant, in response to the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent appalling decision to uphold Tennessee’s ban on gender-affirming care for minors.

That is the resilience that will anchor us in this present-day storm of rising transphobia, homophobia, antisemitism, racism, and many other forms of hate. The hope that Roi’s words embody is our North Star.

Many unknowns lie ahead for our communities, but one thing is certain: we will persist, wholehearted in our conviction and resolute in our joy. 

I am so looking forward to writing this next chapter with all of you. As we turn this first page, I am filled with gratitude for my trailblazing predecessor, Idit Klein, our talented staff, our dedicated Board, and all of you: our committed supporters and fellow community builders, advocates, and educators.

Learning from you and fighting alongside you will be the honor of a lifetime.