We are ingenious in fund-raising, which is good; we are shipwrecked in raising our children, which is tragic. We give of our wealth to many good causes; we lose our substance in abandoning our children to fetishism. I wish we would give priority to teaching and inspiring our children to live as Jews.
We may claim to be a success, but in the eyes of Jewish history, we may be regarded as a failure.
Abraham Joshua Heschel, “Existence and Celebration”, in Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity, ed. Susannah Heschel (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1996), 23. Originally delivered as “Existence and Celebration” in Montreal to General Assembly of the Council of Jewish Federations and Welfare Funds (New York: Council of Jewish Federations and Welfare Funds, 1965).