Last week, I asked one of the volunteers at my work, CONTACT Helpline, about why she volunteers with us. She replied, “ It’s all part of “tikkun olam”, the Jewish concept of “repairing the world”.  Each of us has a role in completing and repairing the world, and this is something that I can do. . . I feel very fulfilled, like I have made a little positive difference in some lives, each time I work.”

“Tikkun olam,” like many words and phrases has changed meanings over time. Originally, the term appeared in the Mishnah, classical rabbinical teachings compiled in the 3rd century. It then was used in reference court proceedings. Modern Jews now use it more as a call to action, as a call to social justice.

Does the world need repairing? Maybe before I should address that question, I should ask: Is the world broken? Without thinking deeper, I would say, yes.  Each battle, each war, each schism, each unresolved dispute, however big or small, has helped rent the world apart a little each time. But… was the world ever whole? If a whole world means unification, I don’t know if the world has ever been truly whole. But can it? It seems impossible, but think it can.

So.. does the world need repairing? Yes, but we can’t return it to what it used to be. Instead, we can unite against the simplest and most complex challenges that every country faces like poverty, racial and class biases, food shortage. The UN and other well known (and not well known) organizations are doing their part. Some of us do it by volunteering on a helpline, some of us do it (or plan to do it, in my case) by working with the elderly, some are philanthropists, some of us protest against injustice. And  some people don’t know what their part is quite yet.

I almost wrote, “I don’t know if the world can be ever unified.” Then I remembered a small moment from the Easter Vigil service I went to at a small, unfamiliar church in New York. We had just lit our candles and were walking back into the church and the precocious wind blew my candle out. Without having been asked, a woman shared her energetic flame with mine. And going forward, I shared the flame again with another whose candle blew out. It was a tiny moment, but a beautiful one. A tiny moment with no politics, no judgment, no right or wrong. Just a moment. But one, if magnified a hundred times could fill the cracks we have made throughout the earth.