Dear Readers,

The following essay is the first of a four-part exploration into a pre-High Holidays relationship with G-d, so that we are not surprised when September comes and someone says 'wow is it that time of year again for the Jewish New Year?' as if the High Holidays never come around in the same (roughly) time period every year!

I encourage you to wait until the end of the series to make any sense of all of it and enjoy!

The Coming of the Jewish New Year and Our Relationship with G-d

Part I - The Need to Get Ready

I know, it is ONLY August ONLY the first week of June and most people are thinking about summer vacations, the Olympics, the kids not being in school, the football season (or by now, trying to forget about it) and the last thing on anyone's mind is the Jewish New Year and High Holidays. Well, almost everyone. I am sure that synagogue administrators are thinking about it, and the clergy are spending some of their summer 'thinking' about the High Holidays and what message they will deliver to their congregates.

I know that as the Lay Religious Leader of Shir Tikvah for the past ten

years, the summer is when I start gearing up, and preparing mentally, for > what I hope will be a series of inspirational sermons (and other prayer moments) for my congregants, and congregation.

But, if I wait too long, or if you wait too long, and do not prepare well

in advance of the High Holidays, then by the time the holidays are here (they arrive in the middle of September this year), it might just be too late.

And we need to prepare early because there is much to be prepared for, and I do hope that the columns that I will be writing between now and the start of the High Holiday period will help you be mentally, emotionally and spiritually ready for what should be a period of intense thinking, thoughtfulness and reflection on the part of every individual, but also of all of us as a community.

Lately, I have been reading a book about relationships, and the seven (yes, 7) aspects of any relationship. At first, I was dubious. The book

sounded like a business manual, or something out of Stephen Covey (the seven habits of success), and I am not usually a big fan of business self-help or how-to books, but this one about relationships, was of interest to me.

Of course, the book is about relationships between people (and in specific men and women), but as I run down the list of the seven parts of a relationship that need to be identified, worked on, cared for, repaired, refreshed and so on, it dawned on me that there is another relationship that we enjoy that this book does not speak about - our relationship with G-D.

Yes, it is true that our faith teaches us that our relationships with our fellow humans are incredibly important. We know this because in the run-up to High Holidays we are commanded (not encouraged) to seek out people and of them forgiveness. And we are commanded to do this prior to the start of the holidays, since we are very much focused on how we are on 'here', on planet earth, and not in the heavens above. But even with that being said, our relationship with G-d is very important as our moral compass and guiding light with respect to everything else we do in life - how we act, live, engage and interact with others.

With all this being said, in the next column we will look at these seven relationship steps and how we can use this knowledge to develop or

strengthen or personal and communal relationship with G-d so that when the High Holidays roll around (and they always do whether we like it or not), we will be more prepared than we ever have before, and regardless of how and where you celebrate the holidays, you will gain more from the experience than you have in the past!

Dr. Adam Bronstone, a native of Winnipeg and its Jewish community, is the Lay Religious Leader of Shir Tikvah in Winnipeg, and has been leading services for this congregation for the past ten years.

This is part of an on-going pre-High Holidays series of lectures with respect to our relationship with G-d and religion, written by Dr. Bronstone.